Tony Stewart, this is not good

[URY914]

Originally Posted by skipdup

There's a reason the kid was so angry...

But not a reason TS was angry. Watch the video. Hard to tell if TS's car even touched Ward.

[john70t]

Originally Posted by URY914

Most Southerns know that NASCAR races are on SUNDAY!

A day of R(oad) & R(age).

[skipdup]

Originally Posted by URY914

But not a reason TS was angry.

Maybe. You might be right.
But most drivers don't usually put someone into the wall they're "happy" with.
It seems more likely (to me) that they were duking it out. Red mist for both.

I'd really like to see gopro footage from TS's car. I think that would answer the question conclusively.
Except, it wouldn't.

[speeder]

The more I read and think about this, he killed him by blipping the throttle when he passed him. I'm not saying that he intended to hit or kill the guy but if he'd simply held steady speed and not turned the wheel like the other cars right before him, the kid would be alive.

He might get away with it but he knows what he did and so does everyone else in NASCAR. He will have to live with it.

I have a good friend, (see him constantly), who was a professional boxer who "killed" someone in the ring. He did absolutely nothing wrong or dirty in that fight or any other but his opponent died shortly after their fight. He is tormented for life by this and has had to do a lot of work on himself to try to get past it. What TS did was a different category. His reckless actions directly caused the kid's death.

[speeder]

Originally Posted by nostatic

If you're going to have those standards, then 99% of the interwebs traffic will cease to exist.

HAhahahahhahahahahahaahaha, etc.

[Nate2046]

Originally Posted by URY914

Strange how people keep bring up TS's "anger".

Why is it strange? You can never truly prove someone's intent, only speculate. In that speculation, past patterns of behavior are relevant. I'm not sure why, given the history, you wouldn't consider this may have been an intentional act gone wrong.

[BE911SC]

"TS" is a notorious hothead on-track. He crowded the kid into the rail and then I'd bet he saw that kid standing in the track waiting for him. TS immediately thought OH YEAH? and went in close to intimidate and humiliate him by showering him with dirt. As stated earlier, his flash of testosterone (kid's too) caused this to go out of hand.

Now TS can stew in legal-team induced seclusion and wonder why his temper goes out of control. Unless he's a psychopath. In that case he's pissed that people are mad at him and that the lawyers are circling. Kinda' like Lance Armstrong not being remorseful about all that cheating.

[skipdup]

I actually feel bad for TS.
Most people seem to say he's a lovely guy off the track.
Even if he wasn't trying to scare the kid (which I "tend" to believe he was), he'll have to live with this forever.

And the kids family... I can't imagine what they're going through.

The whole thing is awful.

[Grog]

Speeder, I can't believe anyone can form a solid opinion from that video. To form an opinion by reading new articles and watching that video is ridiculous. Let the experts on those cars and video geeks do there thing. Also after TS gets his lawyer and does his police interview. I can't believe how fast some people are to judge.

I watched that video at the point of impact over 20 times and I can't tell what exactly the car was doing. Looks like the guy was past the front wheel before the throttle blip, and that blip made the rear move away from the guy. I could not slow it down though, so maybe I'm wrong. I know the rear tires are wider, but do they stick out more than the front? Could be TS saw how close the guy was and tried to move the backend away? We will just have to wait for the investigation. Unless TS admits to trying to scare or hurt him, than I don't see any prosecution coming on this.

Relax people, the only fact is, no one except Tony knows.

[VaSteve]

This was a good article:
Nobody Wins | montedutton.com

It's important to note for those that armchair this (just like many other videos debated here)... the entire thing took less than :30. From the crash to the death. Stuff can get out of hand quick....outside the moment in the jury box, etc it's very different than at the time.

[speeder]

He blipped his throttle as he was going past him. The car twitched and then things went sideways, ( maybe this is the origin of that expression?).

I don't believe for one second that TS intentionally killed the guy, or even meant to seriously injure him. Stuff like this has happened about 1 million times out on the street when someone uses the gas pedal to make a statement or express rage in the moment, often with unintended consequences. I also do not believe that Ward stepped into the rear wheel, I think the car twitched when he blipped it. TS knows what happened but believe me, he's not saying.

[Jeff Higgins]

Originally Posted by T77911S

thats in full race speed.

TS was going SLOW and going STRAIGHT.

"Slow" is all relative. He was still traveling fast enough to get ticketed on any public road in America. These cars have a certain minimum speed; there is no clutch or transmission of any kind. There is a mechanism through which the rear end gears can be disengaged, but essentially if it's running it's rolling. Quite fast, even at what passes as "idle" for a 900 hp alcohol burning smallblock.

This happened very near the corner exit, but certainly still in the corner. Take another look at the video.

That, and I'll bet like any good race driver, once he established where the stationary car was, his eyes were already down the track at the next corner. He had turned inside and left plenty of room to clear the threat (the stationary car), and it was time to close the gap to the car ahead of him. It was just a yellow flag, so any race driver will do that, will bunch up the field behind the cars in front of himself. Once he was sure he was not going to hit the parked car, it was time to get after it and catch up. He never expected anyone to be in the track.

[Tervuren]

Originally Posted by speeder

He blipped his throttle as he was going past him. The car twitched and then things went sideways, ( maybe this is the origin of that expression?).

I don't believe for one second that TS intentionally killed the guy, or even meant to seriously injure him. Stuff like this has happened about 1 million times out on the street when someone uses the gas pedal to make a statement or express rage in the moment, often with unintended consequences. I also do not believe that Ward stepped into the rear wheel, I think the car twitched when he blipped it. TS knows what happened but believe me, he's not saying.

All it takes is one car passing close to the camera to think one on the far side of the track "blipped it".

Until the Police close the investigation, or charges are put in action, I will hold with innocent until proven guilty. I am sure other camera's recorded this, and will make their way to the police, and hopefuly not make it to news vultures to feed on. I am also sure any official investigation will talk with and review things with actual driver's of these cars.

I have heard from two people that were there, ultimately, IMHO, Ward got too close to a short wheel base high downforce vehicle at sub optimal handling speed and conditions. Its like stepping in front of a two trucks passing another semi truck on the interstate. Sure in some hypothetical world the trailing semi truck could see/react in time to miss you.

The time for Tony Stewart to make any conscious decision to "throw dirt" or "intimidate" Ward from when he would notice/see him(if it all) is so narrow as to be difficult for me, or you to ascertain. I also know from racing on "dirt myself" that "throwing dirt" can be nearly impossible on some tracks due to the fact the surface sticks like glue. I am not familiar with this track or track conditions at the time to know, but I doubt "throwing dirt" occurs to a national level dirt racer - because a great deal of the tracks when wetted down for racing it is not really possible to "throw dirt".

[Grog]

He did blip the throttle as he went by, I agree but, watch the video over and over, the rear moved away from the guy. So say you are coming around a corner, drifting a little to the outside (which it looks like he was, hard to tell), all the sudden this guy is running at your car, what do you do? You see yourself drifting into the guy. if you turn left your backend will swing out and hit him. If you turn right, you hit him. Wait for the front tire to pass him, turn right and blip to move the rear away, looks like this to me. Remember this happened so fast but we are talking about one of the best race car drivers out there, looked like a good move but not enough. I hoping that that was his intention. I still have hope for the human race, although it is weakening.

[LakeCleElum]

If I were to speculate, I'd say:

There is a lot of hand wringing going on in a high level HOME DEPOT boardroom today.....

[skipdup]

After being at race speed, in race conditions, 35 - 40 mph (the reported speed he was traveling) under yellow, feels like standing still... super slow motion. TS wasn't going slow... he was going very, very slow.

[VaSteve]

Originally Posted by LakeCleElum

If I were to speculate, I'd say:

There is a lot of hand wringing going on in a high level HOME DEPOT boardroom today.....

Why? They sponsor Matt Kenseth now.

[Baz]

TM would have never been shot......had GZ just stayed in his truck.

Oops...wrong thread.

TS would have never run over that kid....had he just stayed in his car.

[David Goodman]

I'm trying really hard not to speculate.

Two things are bothersome to me:

1. That a professional driver would come to dead stop on an active track unless there was a red flag or he knew he ran over (or hit) something more than debris (or another vehicle).

2. The blip of the throttle. There has been a lot of discussion about it here. Certainly some plausible theories, but the idea that he intentionally induced throttle over steer at that proximity to avoid hitting something seems hard to believe.
Especially waiting until after the object passed the front tires and steering away from the direction of travel (at the wall). Nobody is that good, and in a car designed to over steer to the drivers right. Sorry Grog.

[BE911SC]

Originally Posted by Grog

if you turn left your backend will swing out and hit him.

Under yellow, at yellow speeds, if you turn left the rear wheels will track with the front wheels. TS would have to gas it to get the rear wheels out enough to hit the kid.

TS saw him, defiantly held his line toward the kid to intimidate him, perhaps gassed it to throw dirt on him and hit him instead.

Criminal on TS's part? Unlikely. Stupid on both of their parts? Very likely.