Odds are, you aren’t a racing driver. (It’s OK; neither am I.) Still, that doesn’t stop people from hitting the track and smoking the tires on their daily at drag strips and ovals across the country. It usually ends well, but not always—just ask this guy who put his Chevy Camaro SS in the wall… and on top of it.
The wreck happened during a one-lap spectator drag at Grundy County Speedway in Illinois. It was part of last Saturday’s Tuner Fest Drift IL event where people put their cars, and their pride, on the line against each other. It went off without a hitch for almost everyone, except the Camaro driver who took the extra high line versus a purple-and-white Mazda MX-5.
It’s tricky to see exactly where things went wrong. Both cars were running their respective course with plenty of space between when the Camaro simply kept straight, albeit with plenty of throttle applied. It looks like the front wheels were turned into the corner upon impact but tragic understeer kept it from going left. The sloped angle of the barriers popped the Bowtie up on its side, triggering the airbags and sheering off at least one wheel.
You can hear the car’s V8 revving high even after coming to a stop. It’s unclear if the driver’s foot was pinned down or what, but it eventually lowered to idle before safety personnel at Grundy County Speedway reached the vehicle.
Comments on the Facebook Reel show photos of the aftermath, with one person saying the driver was fine but the car was not. Others immediately pointed to Ross Chastain, the NASCAR driver who rode the wall in his Chevy Camaro stock car and actually won. Chastain called that “the longest wreck of his life,” and I bet the driver in this clip feels the same.
Pour one out for the sad sixth-gen Camaro. They aren’t making those anymore, y’know.
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