Bear Down Wildcats

Chicat wrote:Now they're saying he won't race. It was weird that he would. If I ran over and killed someone, I'd take a day or two off from work to get my head right.

Merkin wrote:So much compassion from NASCAR.

pokinmik wrote:Tony Stewart is a professional, decorated driver and the race was under caution, he definitely saw Ward. I guaran-god-damn-tee Stewart was pissed off and drove very closely to Ward and revved up, basically saying 'fuck you' with his car and unfortunately his tail end swiped out, or Ward walked into the tire and this tragedy ensued. I also guarantee Stewart's brain thought 'oh shit' or holy fuck' right after he did it too....like a toddler with that scared look when they realize they took it too far by punching a sibling or something.

People are delusional claiming that Stewart is totally innocent in this or that he is a poor guy that just couldn't see Ward. It's somewhat of a coincidence that Stewart was the one to hit Ward as well if it was so low visibility.

I get why the media is basically giving Stewart a pass. As many of you have said, Ward shouldn't have been on the track so obviously he shares some blame. And it's impossible to prove whatever Stewart may have or have not done. It's a pretty bold move to accuse Stewart of ill intentions so I get why people and the media aren't going there really. And I wouldn't for a second accuse Stewart of wanting to murder or even hurt Ward, but this was road rage gone awry.

Stewart just has a built-in excuse that it was an accident with Ward acting like a lunatic on the track (though plenty of drivers have walked on the track in anger before). Like CST said I think, only god and Stewart will know.

My view, this should be some type of manslaughter. More likely he'll be dealt with in civil court.

azgreg wrote:Can anybody see this video clearer than I can at work? Supposedly it shows Stewart's rear wheels locked up prior to contact with Ward.

[youtube]1XvhrPu64Co[/youtube]

KNOXVILLE, Iowa — The anniversary arrived Tuesday, and Tony Stewart went to Twitter to make mention of the night his sprint car — and his life — flipped upside down in Oskaloosa, Iowa.

It was one year ago when the three-time NASCAR Sprint Cup champion appeared headed to a sprint-car victory in the Front Row Challenge with five laps remaining until a lapped car spun in front of him and kicked up a cloud of dust.

Stewart didn't have enough time to dodge Josh Higday's car that night, but he steered it just enough at the last instant to avoid the cockpit, potentially sparing Higday serious injuries. The collision sent Stewart's car tumbling around Turn 4 at the Southern Iowa Speedway.

Stewart, who had been slated to drive in nearly 80 sprint car races last year as well as a full Cup schedule, broke both bones in his lower right leg.

In an instant, the season was over for the busiest man in racing.

"When you love something like racing — whether it's a dirt car or the Cup car — as much as I do, and you go from being the busiest guy in racing to all of a sudden being horizontal on the sheets and you can't move every day, that's a pretty big adjustment to your life for a while," Stewart said Wednesday at the charity go-kart race he missed a year ago while recovering in a Des Moines hospital.

The appearance by Stewart and fellow Cup stars Jeff Gordon, Kasey Kahne and Kyle Larson coincided with the first day of the 54th annual Knoxville Nationals.

Last month, in Stewart's first open-wheel race in almost a year, Stewart won in a sprint car at the Tri-County Motor Speedway in Auburn, Mich.

Although Stewart's wreck raised questions about whether full-time NASCAR stars with big sponsorship contracts should be moonlighting in sprint cars during the middle of the season, it also brought safety issues to the forefront.

NASCAR star Jeff Gordon circled the track in his go-kart with checked flag after winning his own charity racing event in Knoxville at Slideways Karting Center on Wednesday August 6, 2014. Also taking part in the event were drivers Tony Stewart, Kasey Kahne and Kyle Larson.

Stewart compared his situation to the safety movement that occurred in NASCAR after Dale Earnhardt was killed in the 2001 Daytona 500. Stewart's wreck prompted sprint car developers to work on torque tube tunnels and tether systems to enhance driver safety.

"The good thing is that it got enough attention to, I guess, get this movement started, and there's a lot of people that are actively working on it right now," he said last fall. "There's going to be something that comes positive out of this negative of being hurt."

Stewart went one step further. He reached out to Jay Masur, a South Dakota native who was one of the first responders at the track the night he was injured in Oskaloosa. Stewart purchased fire extinguishers, safety equipment and worked to find ways track responder crews could become more effective.

"It was a bad situation, and something negative happened, but a lot of positive things are going to happen because of it," said sprint car driver and Front Row Challenge promoter Terry McCarl. "And it's because Tony cares about our sport and dirt-track racing, and he's made a conscious effort through Jay Masur to raise the bar on safety for all of us."

Stewart said he plans to race maybe 10 more times this year in a sprint car. He intends to race again someday in Iowa.
"That's my goal one day — to run the Knoxville Nationals," he said. "A dream for me would be just to make the A-Main here. That would be cool."

Kin of driver whom Stewart nearly killed last year want him banned

CANANDAIGUA, NY — NASCAR hothead Tony Stewart nearly killed a female driver last year on the same track where he mowed down a rival Saturday — and the woman’s family told The Post he should be banned from racing.
“I’m upset because last year, Stewart did the same thing to my cousin, Alysha. He pushed her out of the way, broke her back and almost killed her,” said Greg Cooper, 44, a cousin of sprint-car driver Alysha Ruggles, on Tuesday.
Ruggles, then 19, suffered a fractured back after her car was struck in a 15-car pileup caused by Stewart at Canandaigua Motorsports Park in July 2013.
Cooper was at the track Saturday when Stewart fatally struck fellow driver Kevin Ward Jr. after Ward angrily got out of his car to confront Stewart about being knocked off course.
Cooper said it was clear to him that Stewart was trying to teach the younger driver a lesson by “stoning’’ him with mud, or getting close enough to spray dirt on him. Only things went horribly awry.
“[Stewart] has the audacity to come back this year and thinks he could just push more people around — this time, it was stoning a kid with mud,’’ Cooper said.
“Stewart did this on purpose. He saw Ward out there and wanted to say ‘screw you’ in some way. He was just too close and ended up hitting him.
“You could see his car do a little whiplash maneuver in the video if you watch it closely. It definitely looked like he was trying to splash mud all over Kevin Ward.
“He’s responsible, plain and simple,’’ Cooper insisted, adding that he thought Stewart should be banned from racing.
Ontario County authorities are investigating whether the three-time NASCAR Sprint Cup champion may have hit his throttle moments before smashing into Ward. Lighting at the track also is being reviewed.
The investigation is expected to take at least two more weeks, Sheriff Philip Povero said Tuesday.
“Investigators continue to seek witnesses,” Povero said.
He told The Post that video taken that night will be crucial in determining whether Stewart is criminally responsible for Ward’s death.
“It’s in the videos. We need the videos. If they are out there, we’ll get them,” the sheriff said.

The NASCAR star could be charged with second-degree manslaughter under New York law if prosecutors believe he ‘‘recklessly caused the death of another person,’’ with negligent homicide another possibility, according to criminal law professor Corey Rayburn Yung of the Kansas University School of Law.

‘‘The question over whether someone was reckless is a factual one, and one a prosecutor might let a jury decide,’’ said Yung, who also posts at the Concurring Opinion blog.

Athletes in competition often do things that would get the average person arrested — think two boxers in the ring.

But sometimes an act is so far outside the bounds of accepted sporting behavior that it becomes a crime, as former major leaguer Jose Offerman learned when he was charged with felony assault for rushing the mound — swinging a bat — after he was hit by a pitch in a minor league game.

In a 1949 case that Yung uses in his class, midget car racer Joseph Sostilio was found guilty of manslaughter after he tried to squeeze a four foot-wide vehicle through a two-foot opening at 40 mph, crashing into another car and sending it into the one driven by Stephen D. Bishop. Bishop’s car flipped three times and he was killed.

Sostilio’s conviction was upheld on appeal by the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court. Noting that a violent or aggressive act on a football field or in a boxing ring is not necessarily a crime, Justice Henry Tilton Lummus wrote: ‘‘In the present case physical contact was not an essential part of the racing of automobiles.’’

That was a half-century ago, and racing has changed. Trading paint is a part of the sport, and it’s not even uncommon these days for racers to leave their cars to confront rivals after a crash, which Ward appeared to be doing when he was killed.

‘‘In sports we tend to allow all sorts of conduct we'd never allow in another circumstance,’’ Yung said. ‘‘But this isn’t a collision. It’s not in that ballpark; it’s something you don’t expect. This is a more complicated scenario. We’re assuming Stewart didn’t mean to do this, and yet a death resulted.’’

Jefe wrote:He was trying to toss mud onto the kid

wyo-cat wrote:I don't see how any of this can be put on Stewart.