There are questionable safety talks happening often enough to make one wonder about NASCAR. On July 10th, 2013 there were 31 cars that failed a safety inspection prior to coming out on the track. There are safety flaps on the roofs of the race cars that provide down-force when spinning out of control or crashing. This keeps the cars from flipping or going airborne. 31 of the teams were caught with modified flaps on their roofs that were machined down to reduce weight. All NASCAR did to enforce their rules was confiscate the modified flaps and make them put on new ones. There wasn’t a punishment. This lack of concern for safety by so many teams, and the enforcement of rules seems to be an issue.
Why haven’t NASCAR officials brought down greater punishment for cheating and sacrificing safety at the same time? Fans probably aren’t that excited to find out that so many racers were cheating and nothing was done about it.The problem is that NASCAR doesn’t seem to care as much about safety as one would think. There are actually safer walls that greatly reduce the severity of a collision with them that are available right now. They are called “SAFER” barriers, or “soft walls”. These walls are required on all tracks, but they aren’t required on the WHOLE track. NASCAR CEO Brian France said there was “nothing that prevents us” from putting the SAFER walls on the whole track, and continued saying “We look at this, we think we have them in all the right places, and if we don’t, we’ll make an improvement, like anything else”. Jeff Gordon, a legendary NASCAR racer tweeted after crashing at Charlotte @JeffGordonWeb: “Just saw the video of our wreck. Now I know why it hurt so much. No safer barrier at that part of track???? #Saferbarrierseverywhere!”
-Check out this video on SAFER Barriers and it will show how effective they are : http://www.racingmadesafer.com/#/how-it-works
Finding out they don’t have the SAFER barriers in the right places seems like he means they’re going to wait until someone get seriously injured hitting a non-cushioned wall before they do anything. This lack of concern for driver safety and regulation of safety rules is undoubtedly going to bring a lot of negative attention to NASCAR.
NASCAR’s PR hasn’t handled safety the best way they could. They have set the safety agenda already, by fixing seat belts, and changing the race car to make it safer. They do consistently say on television that safety is always a top priority, but it seems like they aren’t upholding this plan enough for the public to see. The CEO’s quote about the SAFER walls starkly contrasts Jeff Gordon’s comments, and there are multiple twitter feeds about putting up SAFER walls everywhere. Its sending an inconsistent message to the public when these different people say different things. They really need to change their attitude as a company to a singular set of ideas. And they need to be more motivated and firm about safety. There can’t be any gray areas where there isn’t enforcement, or its only safe in some places.
This is an example of Public relations because:
– Safety for drivers is important to the public
-NASCAR addresses this issue commonly and makes statements about safety plans for action.
– They tried to downplay some incidents like the roof flap example, which ended up making it a bigger issue.
-NASCAR has a website dedicated to track safety http://www.nascartrackservices.com/Home.aspx
In order for NASCAR to make any headway in safety they need to look into using situational theory. This allows them to identify a plan using three steps. First, they need to identify the core of this safety problem, and work on stopping it there. Second, they need to see appeal to the public with their new regulations (SAFER, and more strict safety rules with teams). One issue that might arise is the cost of replacing walls on these tracks if the SAFER walls were required everywhere. Since the public cares about the safety of their drivers, this is going to become a big issue if the tracks aren’t overhauled with new walls soon.
Sources Used:
http://www.foxnews.com/sports/2013/07/10/nascar-issues-no-penalties-for-confiscated-roof-flaps-at-daytona/
http://www.usatoday.com/story/sports/nascar/2013/05/30/nascar-safer-barriers-tracks-inside-walls/2374445/
http://www.huntersvilleherald.com/news/2013/8/23/7495/nascar-safety-remains-hot-button-issue
http://www.racingmadesafer.com/#/how-it-works
http://www.nascartrackservices.com/Home.aspx