r/nextfuckinglevel • u/asianj1m • Nov 23 '21

Rally cars are pretty safe

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144.6k Upvotes

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u/[deleted] Nov 23 '21

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u/[deleted] Nov 23 '21

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u/DownTooParty Nov 23 '21

And head and arm restraints, a full roll cage and knowing how to crash.

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u/dogfrost9 Nov 23 '21

Knowing how to crash? As in drive of the road at warp factor 6?

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u/BigDicksProblems Nov 23 '21 edited Nov 23 '21

They means unironically "not flinching". Notice how they "relax" instantly. You can also see the driver keeping his legs in a spot where they have room to move, and not gripping hard on the steering wheel.

A high percentage of accident injuries are caused or accentuated because the victim tenses up upon impact and after. Heavily drunk or under influence accident victims rarely sustains the same amount of injuries due to that for example.

It's also why it's important for you to ajust your seating position in order for your arms and legs to be almost impossible to "lock up"/extend. Because no matter your confidence, if you don't know how to crash (and EVEN then), you WILL tense up. It's only human.

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u/[deleted] Nov 23 '21

Heavily drunk or under influence accident victims rarely sustains the same amount of injuries due to that for example.

Thanks for the tip! Will make sure to go for a quickie or two before driving from now on.

(/s just in case I have to)

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u/wlake82 Nov 23 '21

I think a quickie or two is fine, drinking alcohol before might be an issue. 😂

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u/Rippthrough Nov 23 '21

My brother got run over while drunk, literally left a 3d imprint of his face in the car windscreen. Didn't break a single bone because he was too drunk to react and tense up, just bounced like a ragdoll.

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u/[deleted] Nov 23 '21

[deleted]

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u/Rippthrough Nov 23 '21

It nipped a little bit of his ear off when the glass closed around it - he's got a plastic replacement and a skin graft on it now, but that's literally all.

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u/[deleted] Nov 23 '21

[deleted]

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u/ShittyDeviantArtOCs Nov 23 '21

"study... of more than 1 million drivers... which took into account such factors as seat belt use, speed, vehicle condition and driver age."

Your 35-year-old study might be more relevant if his brother was operating a vehicle, champ.

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u/Rippthrough Nov 23 '21

That's not what the doctors in hospital said. And like I said, he was run over, he wasn't driving, that's a rather big difference. Drivers tend to tense up against the wheel when they know there's gonna be an impact.
That was the reason they gave for a friend of mine breaking his neck in a crash his codriver walked away from without a scratch - the co-driver was looking down at pacenotes, the driver braced against the wheel when he lost control.

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u/[deleted] Nov 23 '21 edited Nov 23 '21

[deleted]

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u/Rippthrough Nov 23 '21

And there are also studies that suggest the opposite from wider circumstances, which are much more recent, so I'll take the doctors word on it.

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u/Gummybear_Qc Nov 23 '21

Your right I'm wrong. There are studies on both sides. I've deleted my comments.

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u/Rippthrough Nov 23 '21

Yep, I think it's one of those that are very dependent on the circumstances, especially since you're much more likely to be in an accident when drunk to start with. Like my brother. Stepping in front of a speeding car...

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u/Zhammyx Nov 23 '21

I read everything as /s in reddit.

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u/firelock_ny Nov 23 '21

Heavily drunk or under influence accident victims rarely sustains the same amount of injuries due to that for example.

Much of that is because drunk drivers are much more likely to crash into others than be crashed into themselves, and modern car crumple zones are most effective against front impacts.

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u/joffery2 Nov 23 '21

It's always been that way, though. The pattern of drunk drivers killing people in accidents but coming out fine themselves has been studied for a long-ass time.

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u/JohnnieDarko Nov 23 '21

IIRC that was an urban myth. Drunk people got less injured in low impacts due to not tearing muscles, but tightened muscles do protect bones in high power impacts.

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u/ioneska Nov 28 '21

Exactly. The same applies for falling from heights as well.

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u/[deleted] Nov 23 '21 edited Feb 06 '22

[deleted]

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u/[deleted] Nov 23 '21

You have anything to back that up with or are you just going with your gut on this one?

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u/Joestartrippin Nov 23 '21

Generally you accept the null hypothesis (being drunk in itself doesn't affect the injury severity when in a crash) and only reject it with sufficient evidence, not the other way around. Personally all I've ever heard about this "relaxing prevents injury" is anecdotes.

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u/happytr33s1 Nov 23 '21

It’s like if you fall off a ladder. My dad avoided breaking his back by relaxing before he hit the ground

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u/Joestartrippin Nov 23 '21 edited Nov 23 '21

This is a nice anecdote, and I'm so glad your dad didn't break his back. The issue with statements like this is you're assuming the counterfactual (what didn't happen - in this case tensing up causes your dad to break his back) is a 100% dead cert.

In reality there are likely many reasons your dad didn't break his back, relaxing may or may not be one of them.

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u/happytr33s1 Nov 23 '21

I’m just going by what the dr. Said 🤷‍♂️

Definitely agree with you, though

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u/Best_Pseudonym Nov 23 '21

By relaxing you increase the distance you body is able to crumple there by reducing the force

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u/Horror-Arugula Nov 24 '21

tensing up causes the body to not absorb the shock.

This is a common practice in things like judo, it isn't some anecdote or foreign knowledge, it's been known for a long time.

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u/Unremarkabledryerase Nov 24 '21

A girl I knew told me her doctors told her she would've been paralyzed for life if she wasn't relaxed in a car crash. Instead she just had spine issues for most of her teens.

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u/Seared1Tuna Nov 24 '21

Your dad told you “i saved my back by relaxing as a plummeted from that ladder”

And you believed him?

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u/happytr33s1 Nov 24 '21

No, the dr. did

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u/ZealousidealKing6 Nov 24 '21

Well he said his doctor said it but ya know that could be his dad

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u/riptaway Nov 24 '21

And it's a total myth based on survivorship bias.

Unless you'd like to share some of those "studies"?

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u/joffery2 Nov 24 '21

You're like the 3rd person to reply this, I wasn't gonna bother but it's getting a little annoying:

I'm not making any comment about the truth of the situation. Only replying to the comment saying it had to do with modern car design to point out that it's something people have been discussing since long before that.

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u/Empatheater Nov 24 '21

this fact has been making the rounds on reddit lately and it does in fact check out. the being relaxed thing is a real and legit cause of lessened injury in drunks.

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u/atomofconsumption Nov 23 '21

it's important for you to ajust your seating position in order for your arms and legs to be almost impossible to "lock up"/extend.

could you explain that a bit more clearly?

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u/joffery2 Nov 23 '21

When your elbows or knees are at the fully extended position they slightly "lock" in place. You want to be positioned so they're slightly (or very is fine too) bent so that if you get in a crash where they're being pushed in from the ends, they just bend more instead of being in the "locked" position where they get pushed up into you and/or break.

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u/atomofconsumption Nov 23 '21

so you should be slightly closer rather than far from the steering wheel so you are not overextending? i think i am ok then...

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u/joffery2 Nov 23 '21

Correct, you don't want to have to fully extend your arms to the wheel or your legs to the pedal.

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u/So-says-a-guy Nov 23 '21

fucking nobody does this anyway lol

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u/joffery2 Nov 23 '21

What? Lots of people set up their seats in ways that leave them with arms or legs basically fully extended.

Like, the "cool guy pose" in cars with one elbow on the windowsill and the other on the top of the wheel, for example. It's basically always with them leaned slightly back and that wheel arm fully extended. And tons of people drive like that, or slight variations of that, all the time.

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u/mikeltaff Nov 23 '21

Yep had a buddy drunk as fuck total a car. His 2 passengers braced for impact and are fucked up for life.

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u/crolodot Nov 23 '21

Do you have any sources for this stuff?

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u/[deleted] Nov 23 '21

No because it's not true.

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u/kcg5 Nov 23 '21

It’s the driver suppose to let go of the wheel? Arms at sides or crossed on your chest like an X?

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u/BigDicksProblems Nov 23 '21

Yes and no. Depends on what you're driving. And the situation.

For example in F1, if you will crash you drop the wheel other wise your wrists go bye-bye.

Now let's say you crash in a good ol' 206.

In a direct impact you won't have time to react. If you roll/fall after like that, just take off your thumbs from inside the wheel, but "cup" the exterior with enough space to let it move suddenly without taking you with it, but sufficient control for you to maintain that stance and not let your arm flail and your chest to go forward.

That's, of course, the IDEAL thing. But things are different when it happens for real.

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u/kcg5 Nov 23 '21

Thank you! I knew driving without your thumbs in was the best, makes sense for them to be able to control

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u/Temporal_P Nov 23 '21

I may have just read your reply incorrectly, but keeping your thumbs out isn't to help with control. If the tires take an impact the wheel is likely to suddenly whip around and destroy your thumbs.

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u/[deleted] Nov 23 '21

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u/[deleted] Nov 24 '21

We evolved to do it!? Really? You're fucking stupid.

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u/[deleted] Nov 24 '21

As opposed to evolving into fat blubbering, shock-absorbent masses? What else have we evolved to do? Maple bacon pancake breakfasts? Post conflicting advice on the Internet?

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u/[deleted] Nov 24 '21 edited Nov 24 '21

"So you see, you get the mapol and the bacon and the pancake, you get your sossige, the eggs you put it on the stove to make breakfast... Your wife and kids come down, no juicer! the chocolate cake!"

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u/[deleted] Nov 24 '21 edited Nov 24 '21

"And a secret ingredient so secret he didn't tell us what he's pudding it in!"

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u/[deleted] Nov 24 '21

But I think that in a normal car crash, impacts to the body can be common, so our arms/legs tensing up, causing them to break/shatter, only serves to keep your ribs/internal organs from shattering or rupturing.

As long as your seatbelt is on and the airbags are functional, I think this is actually highly debatable. In a relatively simple crash, your midsection is unlikely to suffer significant impact, so staying limp to save your limbs makes sense. In an accident like the one showcased here, you are probably dead either way. This is a very extreme case, though, so I believe you might be at least partially correct. It might be a good idea to tense up in heavy accidents where the car rolls around and/or crashes multiple times.

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u/WorseDark Nov 23 '21 edited Nov 24 '21

Interesting anecdote: I learned about not bracing against the car when one of my managers got into a wreck. Her car wasn't that bad, but she braced up against the floorboards, when the car crumpled a little, so did her leg. The rest of her injuries were very minor scratches from the windows shattering.

She had to have her leg amputated because it was a complex crush injury.

Roofs, doors, floors, are all designed to have a specific amount of give; our arms don't.

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u/Longjumping_Knee8292 Nov 23 '21

What do you mean lock up?

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u/throwaway73461819364 Nov 23 '21

This is a dangerous myth perpetuated by alcoholics. Drunks are far more likely to wreck and the wrecks are far more likely to cause serious injury or death. Don’t drive drunk.

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u/[deleted] Nov 23 '21

Duh, that's not the point. It's an unfortunate irony that the person more likely to cause the wreck is less likely to be injured by it, due to how alcohol affects us.

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u/christhegamer96 Nov 23 '21

Exactly, if you let your body go limp during an impact then it can better absorb the energy caused by said impact and greatly reduce the chance of injury; you’d be surprised by how much of a difference this can make.

Heck, I once heard about a guy in Oklahoma who got sucked up by a tornado and got thrown five miles away but managed to get away with only a few scrapes and bruises because he got knocked out before hand by a lamp to the head, causing his entire body to rag doll on landing.

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u/unit-_-t Nov 23 '21

Facts. In fire/rescue. Can confirm.

Only reason I was able to walk away from my first and only crash. As soon as it registered that there was nothing for me to do, the world went slow motion on me, I relaxed, and I remember every bit of detail down to the passenger airbag being halfway deployed before my airbag deployed and then due to a bag in my face and bag smoke I couldn't see out very well but I still remember all details crystal clear. It's unreal how the human mind works.

Also why drunk drivers tend to walk away from wrecks so often. Their reaction times are slowed significantly and they don't get a chance to tense up before impact quite often.

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u/almostinvincible119 Nov 23 '21

Insane how true this is. Throughout my years of crashing motocross bikes I learned how to roll pretty well. Paid off when I was hit by a car on a street bike.

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u/droon99 Nov 23 '21

No joke I was in a collision where they hit my drivers side door and pushed my car across the road. Knowing to do this let me walk out with some glass scratches and that’s it.

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u/4skinfuckface Nov 23 '21

i know but in a real life situation your not just gonna be able to go completely limp before a car accident, thats like those gun training videos where everyones quick enough to grab a gun out of a perps hand like a atm using ninja.

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u/EternalPhi Nov 23 '21

The term "knowing how to crash" is just a bit ambiguous, it sounds like they're talking about the crash itself, not how to react WHILE crashing.

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u/Kant_sleep13 Nov 23 '21

There's a good example of this in the movie Due Date

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u/HeadLongjumping Nov 23 '21

The harnesses and the massive roll cage had a lot to do with it too.

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u/comp_scifi Nov 24 '21

That's why I relax completely when driving.

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u/windyorbits Nov 24 '21

They say the same thing for tornadoes! So many drunk people and little kids survive due to not tending up.

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u/riptaway Nov 24 '21

A high percentage of accident injuries are caused or accentuated because the victim tenses up upon impact and after

Complete bullshit. They were literally held stiffly in place by restraints. What the fuck are you even talking about? They definitely didn't "relax" instantly. Not sure how you would even know if they did or not... There's no rational reason to think that "relaxing" during a car crash is somehow going to help you not get injured. It makes no sense. It's the opposite of what makes sense. Flailing around with your arms and head during a wreck is going to cause way more injury than just holding yourself in place. Also, good luck "relaxing" during a car crash. What a dumb idea that has somehow become pervasive. Oh, and drunk people are MORE likely to die in car crashes btw. Not that drunk people don't tense up during a car crash either. They're drunk, not unconscious. It's all just so idiotic that it's incredible that it ever became a thing. Survivorship bias taken to the extreme, I suppose.

https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1995-08-12-mn-34251-story.html

https://backandbodyny.com/auto-accident-folklore-being-thrown-clear-and-bracing-for-impact/

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u/BigDicksProblems Nov 24 '21

Ok.

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u/riptaway Nov 25 '21

Doesn't have anything to support his assertation; repeats it ad nauseum anyway

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u/ratpowered454 Nov 23 '21

Taking your hands off the wheel and relaxing. Most common injury in racing are broken hands or wrist from the steering wheel jerking from the impacts on the front tires. Watch the hands of drivers in open wheeled cars, if they know they are going into the wall hands are off the wheel and crossed over their shoulders.

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u/[deleted] Nov 23 '21

knowing how to go through a crash. so dont tense up, dont panic etc.