Sam Henderson and John Henderson are the same guy. Most everyone knows him as Sam. He told me he always went by Sam in his short track days and when he used to run this great, honkin' GT1 Camaro. When he started running the Mazda, he decided he would go by John on the entry list. Don't ask me why.

An odd thing that no one has mentioned yet is that Sam's teammate, Brian Dobson, has a very similar accident two or three years ago in almost exactly the same place. Brian was on the second row (an IT7 car in the ITS, ITA, IT7 group, which tells you how fast he is) at the start. He got turned sideways just before Turn 1 and was drilled right in the passenger door by an onrushing ITS RX7. It wasn't quite as bad as this weekend's accident, but it was close. I think the ITS driver had to go to the hospital, but no lasting injuries to my knowledge. The damage to Brian's car was nearly identical to what Sam's received, and it ended up about 100 feet from where Sam's did.

One point I'd like everyone's opinion on. I had a discussion with Sam's crew after the Dobson accident and was told that they built their cages inset by about 3 inches on the passenger side. The logic was that the factory door bars, rocker panel, etc., would be an effective impact absorber/crush space before the impact reached the cage proper. I thought this was somewhat dubious, but after seeing two guys get out of major side impacts with relatively minor injuries, I'm reconsidering. Any thoughts?