The 2005 champion Dan Wheldon did not live long enough to see the safety innovations he was testing become the standard for the Indy Car Series in 2012.
But the 33-year-old Englishman's death yesterday in a fiery 15-car crash at the season-ending race in Las Vegas has raised safety concerns in Indy Car, where drivers duel side-by-side-by-side at over 300 kilometres per hour.
No Formula One driver has died in a race since 1994 and no US stock car driver has been killed since 2001, but Wheldon became the seventh Indy Car driver to be killed since 1996.
Former Formula One champion Jody Scheckter says the oval track in Las Vegas was an accident waiting to happen.
Scheckter says Indy Car racing is the most dangerous form of motorsport in the world and he wants his son Tomas to quit the series.
