In most cases, the inmates running the asylum is a poor idea.
However, in the wake of Scott Kalitta’s June 21 death at Englishtown, N.J., maybe it’s the proper way to effect some necessary change.
Funny Car driver Gary Scelzi, who has fallen into the role of safety siren to the National Hot Rod Ass’n, said, “It’s up to us racers and PRO to stick to our guns. We are the show. If we stick together…we can keep NHRA honest.”
That is an overwhelming assignment. It’s especially tough, considering the sentiment of one team owner following Top Fuel driver Darrell Russell’s 2004 death. A member of NHRA’s ineffectual “Performance Limitation Committee,” he grumbled at the notion of having a driver in the mix. “Why would we want one of them?” he snapped. “We might as well have an oncologist.”
It’s time for NHRA to include input from those who strap themselves into these nitro-powered surface-to-surface missiles. Scelzi said he sees progress and is willing to try, willing to work with the sanctioning body.
NHRA announced July 2 that the Top Fuel and Funny Car classes will race to 1,000 feet instead of the traditional 1,320 feet beginning with this weekend’s Mopar Mile-High Nationals at Denver’s Bandimere Speedway. That, Scelzi said, marks “the first time I’ve seen them take action immediately. I’m hoping this trend continues and they’re not going to stop here. I had a conversation with Graham Light (NHRA vice president of racing operations) on Tuesday before the [June 26-29] Norwalk race, and he told me where he was headed and what he was doing, and I was satisfied with the answer.”

“I don’t want to sit here and say NHRA is a bunch of buffoons. Maybe they haven’t reacted to a lot of the things that I’d liked to have seen them react to. But they are now. So, I certainly don’t want to go backwards.”
— Gary Scelzi

The four-time series champion hasn’t always been as trusting. He stepped out of a Top Fuel dragster after the 2001 season, citing safety reasons and inadequate assurances from officials. So, perhaps NHRA has wised up and recognized what Scelzi said: “We don’t want to go to any more funerals.”
The Mopar/Oakley Dodge Charger driver from Don Schumacher Racing is keeping one eyebrow cocked.
“Now, if things go on and two months down the road, there’s nothing else done, and things just stay status quo, then I’m going to bitch about it,” Scelzi said.
“If they want to ban me or they want to suspend me, you know what? I don’t care,” he said. “I can help push the issue because I have the ear of everyone now, I believe, and so do all the other racers. And I hope this doesn’t go two-three-four months down the road when we get into the Countdown thing and everybody’s worried about the championship and nobody’s worried about safety.
“What we do is dangerous. I understand. But if we can make this thing 10 or 15 percent safer, then we need to do it and we need to do it now,” he said. “And we don’t need to stop there. We need to try to prevent things from happening again. We’re going to go that direction now.
“I think they understand that we can’t have more fatalities and we can’t have more accidents. Our sport has had a clean record for so long and it’s becoming a common occurrence now. Whether the reason is that they don’t want to take the heat — I don’t want to believe that that’s the reason. I want to believe that they’re genuinely concerned, maybe even though things in the past have shown that they weren’t,” Scelzi said. “I don’t care what the reasoning is, as long as they keep taking steps like they’ve taken.
“I want to see them move these scoreboards. I want to see them move these light poles. And I want to see if that starts happening immediately, because that is not a major cost.”
 Is this truly a new commitment for NHRA?
“I don’t want to sit here and say NHRA is a bunch of buffoons. Maybe they haven’t reacted to a lot of the things that I’d liked to have seen them react to. But they are now. So, I certainly don’t want to go backwards,” Scelzi said. “We have made gains…Maybe now we’re on the right path.”
Chris Blair, Las Vegas Motor Speedway’s vice president of racing operations, pledged to Scelzi that track operators are saying, “You tell us what you want and we’ll do it.” So, the drivers have reinforcements.
Scelzi pleaded, too, for his longtime friend John Force not to sit back too long and analyze the situation. Force has declined to speculate on issues pertaining to the Kalitta incident, although he is pursuing The Eric Medlen Project and the Funny Car of the Future.
“I want John Force to jump on the bandwagon about the scoreboard and light poles and obstacles,” Scelzi said. “We can build the safest car we want, but if we don’t keep it safe, it’s all for naught.”
With solidarity from the drivers and a cooperative spirit from the sanctioning body, maybe we never again will have to write about such matters. We can hope.