The Pastor Maldonado boneheaded driver of the week

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For what ?
He spun out a 17 year old kid in a sprint car race. The kid came to the side of the track under yellows to gesture his displeasure at Stewart. Stewart runs him over and the early reports are that the kid is dead.
 
Close the award and rename it. Terrible indeed. If true I'm sure it'll be all over the sports news before the day is out.
 

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Sounds as though Tony revved the engine and sped up as he saw the kid to scare the s**t out of him, but didn't aim at him or anything. Lost his back wheels, the car kicked out and hit the kid.
Yep.

An alleged witness' quotes:

"Tony pinched him into the frontstretch wall, a racing thing," Graves said. "The right rear tire went down, he spun on the exit of (Turn) 2. They threw the caution and everything was toned down. Kevin got out of his car. … He was throwing his arms up all over the place at Tony for most of the corner.

"I know Tony could see him. I know how you can see out of these cars. When Tony got close to him, he hit the throttle. When you hit a throttle on a sprint car, the car sets sideways. It set sideways, the right rear tire hit Kevin, Kevin was sucked underneath and was stuck under it for a second or two and then it threw him about 50 yards."
 
Here's a youtube link .... jeesus. Distressing scenes warning. Excrement will hit the fan, intentional or not...

 
Confirmed dead. I guess you can kind of tell from the video with his toes pointing up and his head facing down. :(
 
Feel sorry for all parties involved in this terrible incident. Video should NOT be on Youtube given the future investigations on the matter. Shouldn't be considered murder. I'd assume that there is a similar rule in America (But can't confirm), but in Australian Speedway you can get suspended (Not that they ever do properly penalise them for any incident) for getting out of the car and running down/onto the track to gesture at a moving vehicle. It is a BIG No-No to do. Tony should not get the full blame for the incident.
 
Watching the incident, Ward is not completely without blame; you'd have to be a special kind of fool to get out of a high-powered vehicle, walk to the middle of a dirt track and point at another driver who's still competing in the race. Ridiculously stupid move.

That said, it's an absolutely horrible situation for all parties involved and I hope Kevin rests in peace. It's hard to tell in that video how much of the blame is Tony's but if he did indeed speed up in an attempt to scare the kid he should cop whatever's coming to him.

Not that it matters but FWIW not really in favour of a thread name change; thread is intended to be good-natured and a bit of a laugh, not really in good taste to rename it after a guy who's just (whether it's his fault or not) killed a 17 year old.
 

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