Skip to content
Link copied to clipboard
Link copied to clipboard

NASCAR driver dies from injuries suffered in N.J. crash

Jason Leffler, 37, who raced mostly in Nationwide Series, crashed during a sprint-car race at Bridgeport Speedway.

Jason Leffler was killed in a sprint-car race at Bridgeport Speedway in South Jersey Wednesday night, June 12, 2013, New Jersey State Police said. (AP Photo/Glenn Smith, File)
Jason Leffler was killed in a sprint-car race at Bridgeport Speedway in South Jersey Wednesday night, June 12, 2013, New Jersey State Police said. (AP Photo/Glenn Smith, File)Read more

WHEN A RACER dies at a racetrack, we often hear "he died doing what he loved."

Jason Leffler, 37, loved racing, anywhere, anytime, but the last thing he expected when he decided to race a winged sprint car Wednesday night at Bridgeport Speedway was to die.

Bridgeport's five-eighth-mile, banked oval in Logan Township, N.J., is known as "the fastest dirt track in the Northeast."

According to one eyewitness account, the left rear tire on Leffler's race car blew coming out of Turn 4, sending the car directly into the wall. Leffler was removed from the mangled car and airlifted via helicopter to Crozer-Chester Medical Center, where he was pronounced dead. The remainder of the night's racing was canceled. New Jersey State Police are investigating the cause of the accident.

Winged sprint cars have 900 horsepower, slightly more than NASCAR Sprint Cup cars, and can reach speeds of 135 mph.

The Long Beach, Calif., native spent most of his decade-plus NASCAR career in the Nationwide Series, running full schedules from 2006 to 2011. He had two wins, 42 top-five finishes and 107 top-10s in the series.

He also ran 73 races in Sprint Cup, most recently last Sunday at Pocono Raceway, where he finished last. Pocono was his only Cup start of the year. In 56 Camping World Truck Series races, he had one win.

Leffler's big break in NASCAR occurred in 2005, when Joe Gibbs Racing expanded to three cars in the Cup series. Driving the No. 11 Chevrolet, Leffler was dismissed after 19 races. He was 35th in points; his best finish was 12th at Martinsville, Va.

Three-time Cup series champion Tony Stewart raced against Leffler in several series.

"Jason Leffler was a great racer and an even better friend," Stewart said. "We raced together a lot, and our career paths were very similar. He loved racing, especially open-wheel racing, and that's a passion we both share.

"To not have him around to talk about whatever race one of us had just run, or were going to run, will be hard. My thoughts and prayers go out to his family, especially his son, Charlie [5], who Jason loved more than anything."

Frank Kerr, crew chief for David Gilliland in the Cup series, was a successful sprint-car racer. During an interview yesterday on Sirius XM, Kerr acknowledged how dangerous sprint-car racing is.

"When you wreck, it's so damn violent, because of the speeds that you go," said Kerr, from Bensalem. "But they're the most exciting things to drive."

Kerr said he broke his back three times in sprint-car crashes.

"[Also] I basically ripped off a finger in a crash and raced 2 days later," he said.

Following Leffler's death, maybe racers from NASCAR's top series will think twice about competing at local dirt tracks. But probably not. Some racers would race 7 nights a week if they could.

"Racing is what we love to do," Kerr said. "Unfortunately, when you're number is up, it seems there's nothing you can change. You don't think the bad one is ever going to happen to you."