Much has been made of the death of Funny Car driver Scott Kalitta and the violent crash that took his life Saturday in Englishtown, N.J. While the NHRA community mourns, some have already begun to speculate the cause of the crash and call for improved track conditions and additional safety measures to prevent a similar incident from claiming another competitor.

FATALITY: Scott Kalitta (left, with father, Connie) died Saturday after a violent crash during the final round of Funny Car qualifications. (NHRA Photo)

As with any death that comes suddenly and tragically, one can only hope that some lesson can be garnered — perhaps some bit of information that might prevent something similar from happening in the future — so that the individual’s death is not in vain.

The motorsports world was left reeling when Dale Earnhardt died in 2001, but from his on-track death has come safety innovations such as SAFER Barriers, head-and-neck restraint systems and other advances that have been instituted in the Car of Tomorrow. In the NHRA, John Force Racing set out on a safety crusade of its own following Eric Medlen’s death in a testing crash at Gainesville Raceway last March. Former Top Fuel and Funny Car champ Kenny Bernstein, who was involved in Force’s violent top-end crash at Texas Motorpolex in September, credited the safety improvements made since Medlen’s death — specifically added roll-cage padding — with saving him from anything more serious than a minor headache after the Dallas crash.

But even more important than the safety issues NHRA competitors will want addressed once they pay their final respects to their fallen comrade comes an important lesson for all of us, even those of us who didn’t know Kalitta.

For me personally, these last two weeks have been a trying time. First came the death of NBC News’ Washington Bureau Chief Tim Russert, a man whom, as a journalist with an intense interest in politics, I held in the highest esteem and whom I had the pleasure to meet a few years ago when I was still in college. Just as I was beginning to recover from the shock of his passing came the Kalitta tragedy.

I’ll be honest; on most race weekends, I didn’t give Scott Kalitta a second thought, so I’m not going to pretend that I’m mourning for a man I didn’t know or whose career I didn’t follow. But seeing someone like Gary Scelzi, who is usually a jokester and solid as a rock, break down during an interview Saturday night on ESPN2 just broke my heart. And then there was Tim Wilkerson the next morning in the pits barely able to keep from crying as he talked about his son Dan, who has his own aspirations when it comes to drag racing.

These are grown men who are well aware of the dangers of drag racing. They accept the possibility that every time they start their engines for a warm-up in the pits or any time they make a pass down the quarter-mile that something could go horribly wrong; that’s the major reason many teams, including Wilkerson’s Levi, Ray & Shoup crew, enforce curfews on race weekends.

Yet the death of Kalitta Saturday in Englishtown nearly brought them to their knees. And for Wilkerson, it was obvious he was thinking as a father — sympathizing with Scott’s dad, Connie — and questioning the logic in climbing into a Funny Car, especially when it comes to his 20-year-old son.

I hope that whatever can be learned from this terrible tragedy — whether if it’s that drag strips need longer run-off areas or whatever — is that life is precious and fragile. Just as NHRA competitors realize the dangers of their profession, so should the average Joe driving to work each morning or crossing the street to use an ATM. Any one of us — drag racer, lawyer, Starbucks clerk, high school student, journalist — could die in a car crash or some freak accident at any moment. The important thing is to live life to its fullest every day and to tell those you love and care about how much they mean to you so that if your time comes suddenly and unexpectedly, there’s no question as to how you felt.

Life is a gift, and that’s what I’ll take from this terrible tragedy.

June 20: The Milwaukee Shuffle

This weekend marks a year since Aric Almirola notched his first NASCAR Nationwide Series victory.

If you just scoffed when you read that line, you know where I’m going with this. A year ago, the buzz in the NASCAR Sprint Cup garage in Sonoma, Calif., on Sunday morning had nothing to do with that day’s Toyota/Save Mart 350 and everything to do with the then-Busch Series AT&T 250 at The Milwaukee Mile the night before.

CHANGING HANDS: Denny Hamlin drove the No. 20 to victory at The Milwaukee Mile in 2007, but the win was credited to teammate Aric Almirola. (Padraic Major/NASCAR Photo)

With Denny Hamlin en route from Sonoma to the West Allis, Wis., facility for the Busch race, Joe Gibbs Racing teammate Aric Almirola put the No. 20 Rockwell Automation Chevrolet on the pole. When Hamlin arrived at the track, he was left hovering above the historic mile, his helicopter unable to land on the track’s helipad, and Almirola took the green flag while Hamlin found alternate transportation to the speedway.

Almirola paced the first 43 laps, but when caution came out on lap 57, the team ordered Almirola, then in third, into the pits for a driver change. Almirola climbed from the car and sulked toward the transporter, and he then left the track without comment while Hamlin scrambled into the No. 20.

With Hamlin behind the wheel, the Virginian powered to the front of the pack and to victory lane as a way of saying “thanks” to Milwaukee-based Rockwell Automation. The win, however, was credited to Almirola because he had started the race.

A month later, Almirola, a driver JGR President J.D. Gibbs said the team had “invested a lot in… time-wise and financially,” was released from his contract after the 2007 season and joined forces with Ginn Racing, which then merged with Dale Earnhardt, Inc. to form a four-car Sprint Cup effort. And two months after the Milwaukee shuffle, Rockwell Automation announced it would not be returning as the primary sponsor on the No. 20 after the 2007 season.

Now fast forward to 2008. What’s become of all of the players involved in perhaps one of the biggest – if not the biggest – controversy in the Nationwide Series last season?

Joe Gibbs Racing, now with Toyota power, has dominated the headlines in both the Nationwide and the Cup series this season. In the Nationwide Series alone, the team has notched 10 victories in 16 events with Tony Stewart, Denny Hamlin, Kyle Busch and rookie phenom Joey Logano. On the Cup side, the team has five victories as well as one of the Gatorade Duel wins at Daytona in February.

Almirola, who is splitting seat time in DEI’s No. 8 Chevrolet with veteran Mark Martin, has made nine Cup starts — three this season — with a career-best of eighth at Bristol in March. He’ll be skipping The Milwaukee Mile — and the anniversary of his win — for the road course in Sonoma. Though he’s not competing on a regular basis, at least, well, he has competed in the Cup Series and has a Nationwide Series win to his credit, even if he himself didn’t take the checkered flag.

And Rockwell Automation? The company, which prides itself in being “there with the right solution when and where our customers need us,” is still doing its thing from its Milwaukee headquarters, though, I’m sure with notably fewer NASCAR fans turning to it for their manufacturing solutions.