Despite racing open-wheel cars for years, Chase Wehr had not flipped. That is, until last Sunday night at Action Track USA.
Wehr was working his way through the field after starting back of the pack in his heat race. He got up to battling for third when things went airborne.
“I was pretty far up on the track,” Wehr, of Schnecksville, Pennsylvania, said. “Logan Dontonville came up the track into my car. I jumped his wheel and that put me into the wall. I had no time to react—I just started going up and over and over.
“It was a long 7 seconds in the air, and I remember every bit of it. I crossed my arms when my car got into the air, and just was hoping that no one would run into me when the car landed. I also didn’t want to land hard on all fours and get a back injury.”
Instead, Wehr landed on his top first. Fortunately, he exited his car under his own power.
“I won’t forget the cheer the crowd gave me when I got out of the car,” said Wehr. “Afterward, Logan [Dontonville] came up to me and apologized, which meant a lot to me.”
Wehr sat in a full-containment seat from The Joie of Seating, with Impact belts. He wore an Impact helmet paired with a Simpson Hybrid head-and-neck restraint. His car from Hyper Racing didn’t seem too bad upon early inspection.
“Everything was intact on our Hyper chassis, though we noticed the frame was bent just a little bit,” Wehr said. “We’re taking it back to Hyper.”
Chase Wehr has a week off from Action Track USA, which should give him some time to make necessary repairs.
“It’s just racing, things happen,” said Wehr. “Everyone says that and I keep telling myself that.”
Mike Adaskaveg has written hundreds of stories since the website’s inception. This year marks his 54th year of covering auto racing. Adaskaveg got his start working for track photographer Lloyd Burnham at Connecticut’s Stafford Motor Speedway in 1970. Since then, he’s been a columnist, writer, and photographer, in racing and in mainstream media, for several outlets, including the Journal Inquirer, Boston Herald, Stock Car Racing, and Speedway Illustrated. Among Adaskaveg’s many awards are the 1992 Eastern Motorsport Press Association (EMPA) Ace Lane Photographer of the Year and the 2019 National Motorsports Press Association (NMPA) George Cunningham Writer of the Year.
