Formula 1 driver Lando Norris has led growing calls for a change to the way circuits are constructed following a string of jarring crashes.
Race tracks around the world utilise what is known as a ‘sausage kerb’, a type of speed bump designed to deter drivers from shortcutting. The kerbs are often placed at the apex of corners, on corner exits, or in paved run-off areas.
As evidenced by recent crashes, the kerbs have one significant flaw – if struck at high speed, cars tend to launch skyward. The most recent was perhaps one of the most spectacular.
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During last weekend’s FIA World Endurance Championship 6 Hours of Monza, Henrique Chaves spun at the Variante della Roggia chicane and hit a sausage kerb sideways.
Acting like a ramp, the contact spectacularly sent the car upside down into the air.
Such was the ferocity of the hit that it ripped the passenger door off.
Eventually, the car came to a rest on its roof, although not without flipping once more.
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Only one week earlier, a clumsy incident in the FIA Formula 2 Championship at Silverstone saw Red Bull junior Dennis Hauger cast off the track.
Out of control, he skipped across the grass before striking a sausage kerb.
The car took flight, nose-first towards Roy Nissany’s head. If not for the Halo protection device, Nissany might not have walked away unscathed.
In both instances, the drivers were uninjured. However, several haven’t been so lucky.
Sophia Flörsch, Alex Peroni, Abbie Eaton and Sean Galael all broke their backs in Formula 1 feeder series races across Asia, Europe, and North America – the lion’s share at circuits where grands prix take place.
It’s an issue that’s drawn the ire of McLaren driver Lando Norris, who has called on the sport to abandon the use of the sausage kerbs after the latest spectacular crash.
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“Thankfully, despite one of the car’s doors coming off mid-air, and debris flying about all over the place, Chaves was able to walk away unharmed,” Norris wrote in The Telegraph.
“But the car should never have been sent airborne in the first place. Certainly not in such violent fashion. These things are always more complex than they seem but there is one thing I am concerned about: sausage kerbs.
“I have been critical of raised kerbs in the past, but I think it is time we acted on these warnings and removed them from our sport.
“Chaves’s crash was the second big one in two weeks after the incident in the Formula 2 race at Silverstone when Dennis Hauger’s car was launched into the air when he struck a raised kerb, crashing into the halo safety device of rival Roy Nissany.”
Although instances of cars hitting kerbs and getting airborne in Formula 1 are rare, Norris is fearful the world championship could be blighted by similar incidents.
“With Formula 1 cars running lower to the ground than ever, and stiffer than ever, we need to act because when these cars hit these kerbs, you do not ride them,” Norris added.
“You can be launched into the air. Cars can pop up, do big wheelies and then slam back down again, which can be very painful on the back.
“Chaves’s crash last weekend is a reminder that we cannot let this drag on. Issues such as sausage kerbs are, in my eyes at least, a critical topic that we need to sort out sooner rather than later.”
The 2022 Formula 1 season continues at Circuit Paul Ricard for the French Grand Prix on July 22-24.
Norris sits seventh in the drivers’ championship with a season-best third in the Emilia Romagna Grand Prix at Imola.
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