Grant Adcox Dies - 1989 Atlanta Journal 500

[ChrisBChronisterJr92]

How did he actually die from the fire? or the hit?

[anglim45]

@ChrisBChronisterJr92 He died from the hit when the seat dislodged, killing him

[Ronin27x]

Why no red flag?

[jazzbo1974]

Didnt it end up coming out they were sure he had heart attack ?

[Superpepsiman20]

safty crew there in under 30 secs pretty good.

[auaiao9]

Grant's father, Herb, still operates a car dealership here in Chattanooga but lost the Chevy franchise recently because of GM's cutbacks. Grant would now be 59/60, so that would make his father in his mid to late 80's. I would've thought he would close the business years ago when there was some question about the way he handled some of his business, or when he lost the Chevrolet lineup but he's still at it. He's been on Lee Highway for 42 years. Another location or two before that.

[0verdrive177]

grants and chad colemans wrecks where just about in the same spots

r.i.p.

[JoeytheHDK]

@0verdrive177 Actually, they were on opposite ends of the track. The track was inverted and reconfigured in 1997, and Chad Coleman's crash occured in the old turn four - turn two. Adcox's crash occured in what is now turn four.

[0verdrive177]

@JoeytheHDK your right i forgot about the invertion

[Georgeous129]

man, if i was a NASCAR driver, i'd be totally scared of racing at this circuit

[anthonystuart69]

@Georgeous129 you'd be surprised how much safer it's gotten, even the most horrible crashes wind up far less serious than some of the most minor crashes from 20 years ago. search "Michael McDowell" for an example, Texas is very nearly identical to Atlanta.

[simmplemann]

atlanta is a fast and dangerous track alot of drivers have died there rip to all of them.

[lghdride]

THIS WAS & IS My BEST FRIEND

GOD BLESS YOU GRANT ADCOX; TERRY RICHARDSON

[elsenorpollojorge]

I remember watching this like it was yesterday...I was like 7 years old. They didn't announce his death until after the race and my folks didn't tell me that Adcox had died for fears that it would upset me. I read about it in my uncle's copy of Midwest Racing News some time later.

[Blamed1]

@elsenorpollojorge yeah, so do i n i was 1 years old at the time............

[CourtyardPigeon]

Adcox crashed heavily on lap 198 of the event and died of major chest and head injuries, also suffering a heart attack as result of the crash. Upon investigation, it was determined that the severe impact had torn his improperly mounted racing seat away from its mount entirely and this led to Adcox's death. It also led to new safety regulations on the way seats were mounted for the 1990 season.

[Hlover01]

isn't it sad that nascar only makes cars safer after someone gets killed and it shows flaws in the car? At least no one will be getting killed any time soon :)

[erasetoimprove]

better than what every other racing series does.... makes no changes until 5 to 10 deaths lol

[kidd1023]

lol you copied that word for word from wikipedia

[ImEastonianBitch]

Way to copy and paste from wikipedia.

[CourtyardPigeon]

I never said I wrote it you idiots. I'm not a fucking doctor with Nascar. I was simply referring to someone's comment about the heart attack, so I got the official report and posted it. Fuck off.

[ImEastonianBitch]

You are MAD.  How about we try not to look smart on youtube. ok?

[Kevins713]

This was the final race in 1989, and was postponed due to inclement weather. It was held the weekend before Thanksgiving, and temps were NEVER above 45 degrees F. I attended the race, and Grant hit the wall almost in front of me. There was conjecture he might have had a heart attack or seizure, because he NEVER turned away from the wall. There was no braking apparent, and he his at a very severe angle to the first turn wall.

[cincyblows]

Grant Adcox was a natural. He was a great driver who never had the sponsorship.

[InvisibleTeeth]

@cincyblows I've just surmised he was the 80's version of Bobby Gerhart and that's about it.

[glassgodofdoom]

No doubt a right front tire blew . those cars had half seats in them with a tiny cushuion attached to the roll cage behind the drivers head for impact . they were death traps.

[Cynon44]

I don't think F1 has much to talk about, considering 85% of F1 drivers can't make a pass without crashing somebody... there are a few great drivers that have driven in F1... Senna, Fangio, Schumacher, but a ton of drivers that don't belong there. Beer bellied rednecks can race like hell, which means constant overtaking.

[indigoblue555]

to Cynon44-

well,F1 is an all different racing.

It can't reasonably be compared to any other

class if not,at far,Cart/Indy.

Overtaking in F1 are extremely hard:we must think about the trackings,the outstanding braking power,the slightest performance gap among the competitive cars starting in the first 4 rows.Sth has been changing since a few years but substantially it still is the most sophisticated racing class.

May be the most soporific as well omop,that's why I quitted watching it.

[gmn52]

I was a crewmember on a car that raced against Grant in the late 70's. Grant was a class act. As a person he was my favorite driver. Whether he was running well or running poorly he was the same man. He was always laughing and joking. RIP man.

[kinshasaAPP]

Back then, they used to dzus-fasten seats instead of bolt them in. This may have happened.

[supercomet32]

no they didnt. dzus fasteners have never been weight supporting fasteners and were not used to hold a seat in nor seat betls...hold padding on maybe but not the seat itself

[e521soediv]

STFU

[RoudyBusch18]

man, whenever i see a fatal clip, the announcers have no idea that they just saw someone die, they just act like its a normal crash.

[glassgodofdoom]

nascar policy dude, the show must go on , they will never annouce such news until after the family has beeen notified . imagine hearing your son died on TV . that would not be good .

[erasetoimprove]

they know... they can listen into every NASCAR scanner frequency... spotters and NASCAR control... but it would be offensive and unprofessional for them to announce such things LIVE ON THE AIR. What are they going to say "Well it looks like they're giving him CPR... nope, scratch that... he's dead". i think not!!!

[gobackto82]

@erasetoimprove

[GoMarkGoPack]

Did Mark Martin cause him to cash because he blew his motor

[Sonicnascar11]

Read this Adcox continued to run sporadic Winston Cup races among the years. Adcox qualified for the 1975 Talladega 500, but his crew chief Gene Lovell suffered a heart attack and died in their garage. The car was withdrawn, Adcox filled in for another team, in an ironic twist of fate, as the race was delayed a week by heavy rains. The first alternate, Tiny Lund, was given their spot on the grid. Lund would be killed in a violent lap seven crash.

[PhilipTheBigOne]

@Sonicnascar11: CREEPY!!! RIP!!!

[NickPatrick2]

Is Ned Jarrett the daddy of Dale?

[Sonicnascar11]

yes, R.I.P.

[fueldragster]

Ned Jarrett is still alive

[Sonicnascar11]

I ment R.I.P. Grant

[CourtyardPigeon]

You can see him against the steering wheel at the end of the crash, but then it appears that he leans back to the seat.

[SeanHarbin]

And at what time did u see this? The view wasn't close enough to see him in the car.

[Ernde383]

The car isn't a NASCAR, ya jerk! NASCAR is the name of the organization. It's just a car!

[AficionadoLimo]

@Ernde383 I hate when people say that too lol.. They are stock cars. People who don't follow auto racing don't realize that there are multiple NASCAR series' throughout the country, with series in Canada and Mexico as well. (The Sprint Cup Series is the top tier).

[anthonystuart69]

@Ernde383 THANK YOU! I HATE WHEN PEOPLE SAY THAT!

[thepspman116]

@Ernde383 it's a stockcar.

[mintedllama]

Read the description you morons. The seat broke.

[e521soediv]

yea tell that to APOLAIYSE37

[NickPatrick2]

The seat breaking was often the fact that made simple wall contact tragedies.

[e521soediv]

you dont even see what happens he could of flip for all we know the replay just shows him already against the wall APOLAlYSE37

[jmoney11]

R.I.P Grant Adcox

[APOCALYPSE37]

is it me or are the crashes getting lighter

but deadlier? was it a bad time for car safety designs,ive seen worse crashes than this happening between two old grannys driving their cars around in the supermarket car park looking for the exit! ~its now the 3rd fatal accident ive seen in a row

which has shown us the aftermath of the fatal accident,and all you can see is a racing car with a slightly dented bumper and some scratched paint

[copperhead29]

I believe in the old saying Your time to go.

[mintedllama]

The cars were rolling bricks with little energy dissipated on impact. The more damage you see on a car the more likely it was that the driver survived.

[girlcandream]

This wreck was almost twenty years ago, so, no, I don't agree with you. Perhaps at the time of this crash this was true, but I'm not sure that's what you mean.

[ballsthatclank]

His seat broke and his chest was crushed is what happened.

[gbop63]

Grant Adcox's family was rich. They could have bought the best car on the circuit...but they borrowed that car for this race from Childress. His injuries were nasty chest and head from the seat breaking loose and exploding him into the steering wheel and dash. The injuries were fatal, the heart attack was just along for the ride.

[texnation]

Wow Atlanta had a nice helipad.

[Ernde383]

And a bad deathrate.

[NCG81]

I had always heard he hit the dash with the seat still attatched to him & that it was a Childress borrowed car, thats what I was told about it

[bubslate]

he died of a heart attack not only that but his seat was loose. ironicly the heart attack killed him not just the broken ribs and head injurys. Realy sad i hurd he was a good driver.

[3fan4eva]

He was a pretty good Restrictor plate driver, he won a couple of ARCA races at Talladega and one at Daytona i think... I thought the main reason why he died is because the seat broke causing him to smash his chest into the steering wheel causing the heart attack..am I wrong?

[SimRacin14]

Adcox won 4 races at Talladega in 1986 and 1987,before they put plates on the cars. Still a good superspeedway record nonetheless. I have an ARCA results website with quite a few old Talladega races on it.

[JUMALA24]

so sad i`am so sorry

[Sunoco]

hoe did he die? Very minor looking accident.

[e521soediv]

you never even see the moment of impact in the video so what you talking about and there nothin minor about accidents

[meatmarket]

Wow, that's eerie. Thank you for posting. Weird how they were sort of joking around there, not knowing that a driver was dying.

I think if that accident had occurred now, Grant would have survived and gone onto the next race. But they just didn't have the technology back then.

RIP Grant.

[Ernde383]

Plus, it took them FOREVER to get him outta the car. He may have survived if it wouldn't have taken them 12 minutes to get him out.

[gretzkysyotes]

And you would think, that NASCAR would learn from that...and hire a traveling Safety Team as they do in IRL/Champ. Travelling EMT's/Paramedics who know all the drivers, not the local guys who usually know nothing of auto racing.

[Ernde38]

But they don't need to know with the no racing back to the yellow flag and the COT.

[reds44dunn]

dose any one have Terry Schoonover wreck

[coolconman1]

yes, look up nascar and then search for date added. then it should be one of the 1st videos or on the first 3 pages.

[setoguchifan16]

@reds44dunn a user named Nukokatze has it

[reds44dunn]

how did a pit crew guy get killed i never heard that

[3fan4eva]

I belive he got hit or run over, not sure

[LunceFordPrefect]

In the 1990 Atlanta season finale Mike Rich was the right rear tire changer on Bill Elliott's car. During his stop, Ricky Rudd came in to the pits hot (no speed limits back then) and locked up the brakes spinning his car around and basically crushing Mike between Rudd's car and Elliott's when he was changing the tire.

[IllinoisHighwayMan]

That explains why there is a speed limit on pit road nowadays in NASCAR.

[mdp4499]

Q: Didn't a pit guy get killed @ this race?

A: No, that happened in the next year's Atlanta Journal 500

Q: Who won the race?

A: Dale Earnhardt

Q: Who was the last onwe to killed b4 grant?

A: Terry Schoonover in the 1984 Atlanta Journal 500.

[fatpatlives1998]

@mdp4499 damn...atlanta done killed just as many people as talladega and daytona :(

[reds44dunn]

who was the last onwe to killed b4 grant

[reds44dunn]

who won the race

[sk24]

Dale Earnhardt.

[ehobeckracing]

didn't a pit guy get killed @ this race?

[butthole99]

He died because of his seat being improperly secured. When he hit the wall, basically he(nice and secure in his seat with the seatbelt)smacked against the inside of his car.

[meatmarket]

Wasn't there something about him having a heart attack as well?

[udfan4life]

yes jusy click on more when u see Here's a capture of Grant Adcox's fatal and u will get more infor

[butthole99]

IIRC, Mark Martin blew an engine in this race and had an oil fire(No he wasnt hurt at all). Thats just something I seem to recall from watching this live at the time.

[DanielKy82]

I didnt know that wreck happened the same day Rusty won his only Cup. Learn something everyday

[GoJohjimaJihad]

This was the same day when Rusty Wallace wrapped up the Nextel Cup title.

[jlgbgky]

You mean Winston Cup, don't you? Nextel didn't start sponsoring the Cup series until 2004.

[James0829]

After the Grand National Series, then Winston was forced to cease sponsorship, it was determined that ALL Champions and racers since 1948 were Nextel racers and Champions, and subsequently Sprint Cup. So drivers that never drove for or even heard of a cell phone before their death, were Sprint Cup Champions. Austensibly to eliminate confusion.