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July 17, 2026 at
12:35:14 AM
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08/26/2017
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July 17, 2026 at
06:42:35 AM
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05/26/2005
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A 4'x8'x2" sheet of dense polystyrene sells for about $48 a sheet in the construction industry. That works out to about $9 per cubic foot, These blocks look to be 4'x8'x3'= 96 cubic feet. The materials in each block are worth around $864 each.
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July 17, 2026 at
08:11:16 AM
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Reply to:
Posted By: egras on July 16 2026 at 09:25:22 PM
I'm completely unfamiliar. This is what is at Fremont? Stand-alone styrofoam blocks?
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You are completely unfamiliar with more than a few things, but yet you feel the need to post misinformation. Hmmmmm.
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July 17, 2026 at
11:37:00 PM
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02/20/2005
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Ok, I'm going to show my age here. But we're not really talking about styrofoam blocks sitting against existing walls are we? I first saw this concept in an Open Wheel magazine about 35 years ago. Going strictly off of my memory, they did this only on pavement tracks. It looked like a great idea but a crash left styrofoam all over the track (tiny pieces). On the pavement track they had a truck with a sweeper kind of thing that could push all of the debris off of the track and a new foam block set in place with a forklift before the cars would be cleaned off the track. At least that's how this article made it sound from my memory. But I never thought it would work at a dirt track. The first thing I wondered about was on a dirt track, would these chunks of styrofoam be ground into the track? Well the sweeper truck was removing debris, could it also remove the rubber laid down on the track? Also on pavement race cars there's not near as much debris being kicked off of the tires, what about the dirt/mud/dust kicked off of the tires of sprint car. Could those styrofoam bariers stand up to the abuse of a sprint car running inches from them with the dust coming off of the RR tire (which I would think would be similar to sand blasting) also could or would they be able to withstand cars bouncing off of them?
Any safety idea needs to be looked at and examined by those much smarter than us. However I don't think this is a practical solution for dirt sprint cars. Walls that give are a great idea in concept. But I like what NASCAR has with the SAFER barriers.
However, I want to ask this. Over the last 30 years how many drivers have been seriously hurt or worse because the walls were too hard? From the stuff I've seen and heard about the majority of injuries were due to cars striking a non normal obstacle (like the end of a wall or a pole or another object) or landing awkwardly (like Kevin Swindell's crash) or another car hitting them after they have crashed. I could be wrong so if there has been a serious crash because the wall was "too hard" please let me know.
Again, I want to be clear that I think safety should be the utmost importance in this sport. But I'm not sure this is the most productive place to spend money on safety? This is great for high speed wide racetracks like many NASCAR tracks. But in dirt sprint car racing where many times the cars are running inches off of the wall, if there's a mishap they probably aren't going to run into the wall head (or close to it) on at full speed from a blown tire like what we see in NASCAR.
Also I see the talk of cost has come up here. It's kind of disgusting to me that costs are an argument in safety. If you are going to argue that you can't keep a safe track because it would eat into your profits too much. Just close it down please. No, I don't want to see anymore tracks close but if you're willing to gamble somebody else's life because it's "too expensive" for you. Please find something else to do.
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July 20, 2026 at
01:58:42 AM
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04/14/2007
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Reply to:
Posted By: hardon on July 17 2026 at 11:37:00 PM
Ok, I'm going to show my age here. But we're not really talking about styrofoam blocks sitting against existing walls are we? I first saw this concept in an Open Wheel magazine about 35 years ago. Going strictly off of my memory, they did this only on pavement tracks. It looked like a great idea but a crash left styrofoam all over the track (tiny pieces). On the pavement track they had a truck with a sweeper kind of thing that could push all of the debris off of the track and a new foam block set in place with a forklift before the cars would be cleaned off the track. At least that's how this article made it sound from my memory. But I never thought it would work at a dirt track. The first thing I wondered about was on a dirt track, would these chunks of styrofoam be ground into the track? Well the sweeper truck was removing debris, could it also remove the rubber laid down on the track? Also on pavement race cars there's not near as much debris being kicked off of the tires, what about the dirt/mud/dust kicked off of the tires of sprint car. Could those styrofoam bariers stand up to the abuse of a sprint car running inches from them with the dust coming off of the RR tire (which I would think would be similar to sand blasting) also could or would they be able to withstand cars bouncing off of them?
Any safety idea needs to be looked at and examined by those much smarter than us. However I don't think this is a practical solution for dirt sprint cars. Walls that give are a great idea in concept. But I like what NASCAR has with the SAFER barriers.
However, I want to ask this. Over the last 30 years how many drivers have been seriously hurt or worse because the walls were too hard? From the stuff I've seen and heard about the majority of injuries were due to cars striking a non normal obstacle (like the end of a wall or a pole or another object) or landing awkwardly (like Kevin Swindell's crash) or another car hitting them after they have crashed. I could be wrong so if there has been a serious crash because the wall was "too hard" please let me know.
Again, I want to be clear that I think safety should be the utmost importance in this sport. But I'm not sure this is the most productive place to spend money on safety? This is great for high speed wide racetracks like many NASCAR tracks. But in dirt sprint car racing where many times the cars are running inches off of the wall, if there's a mishap they probably aren't going to run into the wall head (or close to it) on at full speed from a blown tire like what we see in NASCAR.
Also I see the talk of cost has come up here. It's kind of disgusting to me that costs are an argument in safety. If you are going to argue that you can't keep a safe track because it would eat into your profits too much. Just close it down please. No, I don't want to see anymore tracks close but if you're willing to gamble somebody else's life because it's "too expensive" for you. Please find something else to do.
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I saw the 49 wreck the other night and it looked like the styrofoam might have saved the car, and maybe lessened the blow against a guys knee and less of a whiplash. I decided to start a conversation about it.
I've only been to Fremont once. I was selling NSSN and Kenny Roger cars for Danny Smith. Deweases mom was selling t-shirts for Lance. We agreed to watch the races the other wasn't in.
I saw an extremely terrible wreck in turn one. Styrofoam went everywhere. The driver and car raced again that night. Styrofoam floated in the air all night long, but no one cared. It was kinda neat, everyone survived, and the race was awesome.
I just think its a great thing to think about when it comes to racing safely.
Brandon McLain
United Sprint Car Series Driver
2014 Season
National Rookie of the Year!
National Points - 8th
Southern Points - 3rd
Asphalt Points - 3rd
18 Races, 3 Top 5's, 14 Top 10's
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