As James Rice puts on his Simpson Hybrid Pro head-and-neck restraint system before the Schaeffer’s Oil Iron-Man Championship Late Model Series event at Tennessee’s Wartburg Speedway, he takes a look at his family — his wife, Jessica, and daughter, Blake. Loved ones can break a racer’s intense focus and remind them of why they need to take safety seriously.
“When I’m getting into the car, all I’m thinking of is what I need to do when I get onto the racetrack,” said Rice, 27, of Verona, Kentucky. “[The dangers of the sport], yes, it definitely crosses my mind, but leading up to that point.”
Rice takes his safety seriously. His personal safety equipment includes a Leaf Racewear two-layer fire suit, Bell Racing USA helmet, ButlerBuilt full-containment seat, Hooker Harness five-point harness, and a Firebottle fire suppression system inside his Rocket Chassis XR-1 dirt late model.
“A lot of guys [feel safety equipment is] an inconvenience, because it’s another thousand dollars for a Firebottle [system],” said Rice. “It does suck to have to buy them, but in the long run, you have all this money in a race car anyway, what’s another thousand to be safe?”
In Rice’s early years of racing late models, today’s modern safety equipment was virtually unheard of.
“When I first started, in 2011, I had a [seat with a] single headrest and no head-and-neck restraint,” Rice said. “Once you sit in [a full-containment seat], and get used to it, it is more comfortable. I don’t mind the big headrests anymore. I don’t know if I could race without it. Some people get claustrophobic sitting in there, but I like all that tightness around me. It makes me feel safer.”
While safety equipment comes as an afterthought for some racers, James Rice remembers a major reason for investing in it.
“My little girl is all I think about these days,” Rice said. “It would be terrible if anything happened to me.”
The Outside Groove Executive Editor has covered motorsports since 2000. His many awards include the 2019 Eastern Motorsport Press Association (EMPA) Jim Hunter Writer of the Year and the 2013 Russ Catlin Award for Excellence in Motorsports Journalism.
