THURSDAY,AUG.23,2001
SPORTS
THE UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAN - 13A
Students to rent affordable camping gear with new program
Program will encourage weekend camping trips into the great outdoors
By Kevin Flaherty Kansan sportswriter
Students interested in the great outdoors now have an opportunity to rent brand new camping equipment at reasonable prices through Outdoor Pursuits, a new University program.
The new service will replace the Wilderness Discovery program, which closed down because of Jaybowl expansion on the first floor of the Kansas Union.
Outdoor Pursuits will offer the chance
to rent tents, sleeping bags, cookware and backpacks from a yet-to-be chosen campus location.
Eventually, it will be in the new recreation center.
Erik Schreiber, intermural sports program manger, will head up the program, and said he would like to start as early as next spring when students come back from break.
"Right now we are looking at different suppliers and prices," Schreiber said. "But we are very excited about the opportunities this gives students to come in, rent some gear and go camping for the weekend."
Based on similar college programs which have had success at schools including Texas A&M, the service also
"But we are very excited about the opportunities this gives students to come in, rent some gear and go camping for the weekend."
Erik Schreiber Program manager for intramural sports
will provide day seminars on camping and wilderness first aid.
Schreiber said if student interest was large enough, he foresaw expansion into
cannot embarrass Ted Kuether, Topeka junior, said he wasn't completely sold on Outdoor Pursuits.
canoe rental and beyond.
"I think that it's a good idea, to get people outdoors without the cost," Kuether said. "But I don't know that it's a great idea to get people who aren't outdoorsy to all of a sudden go camping. It could be dangerous."
Eric Cloud, assistant manager at Backwoods Equipment Company, 916 Massachusetts St., said he believed students would like the idea.
"I think it's a great opportunity, obviously, for the financial reason that it's cheaper to rent than to buy your own equipment," Cloud said. "It's a great hands-on experience and they also get to
Outdoor Pursuits
It will be a University service aimed at giving students an opportunity to rent out tents, sleeping bags, cookware and backpacks for camping excursions.
When: Next spring.
determined campus location.
try out different types of equipment, different tent sizes, backpack styles and preview (them) to find out what they like before they buy."
Study gives no concrete suggestions for NASCAR safety
n Reach Flaherty at 864-4810
The Associated Press
ATLANTA — The exhaustive six-month investigation into Dale Earnhardt's death is finally over. Now the real work begins for NASCAR, which still must find a way to make its sport safer.
NASCAR released its inquiry into Earnhardt's death on Tuesday, finding that a variety of factors — including a broken seat belt — all played a part in the fatal accident on the final lap of the Daytona 500 on Feb. 18.
In addition to the details of the accident, the report made several recommendations as to how NASCAR can improve its sport.
None of them are immediate nor guaranteed to prevent another death.
"We are still not going to react for the sake of reacting," NASCAR president Mike Helton said. "There's not a bulletin getting ready to go out this afternoon to change walls at race tracks or roll bars in race cars.
"But there was an effort that began this time last year, and that became very aggressive as we were given opportunities in a very tragic way to understand things that we never understood before."
In its two-volume report, NASCAR said that beginning next season it will install "black boxes" in cars, similar to flight-data recorders on airplanes, to help understand the forces during crashes and improve safety.
NASCAR will also use computer models to design safer cars and will be involved in testing of race track barriers. The organization will commission a study on restraint systems to take a closer look at seat-belt strength.
NASCAR also will open a research center in Conover, N.C., sometime next year and will continue to work with experts on car safety.
However, the report contained no recommendations on changes
to cars or barriers, and NASCAR said it will not require drivers to wear head and neck restraints, despite encouraging their use.
Earnhardt was not wearing a restraint when he was killed, but NASCAR said it was unclear whether the device would have saved him. Use of the devices has dramatically increased since his crash; 41 of 43 drivers wore them in Sunday's race.
"We are pleased that a majority of Winston Cup drivers now use them," Helton said. "But we are not completely satisfied. We have intensified our efforts with drivers, equipment manufacturers and outside experts with the goal of helping all drivers find a system in which they feel comfortable and safer."
Many of the drivers — who heard the report and the suggestions Tuesday morning — said they were satisfied with the direction NASCAR is headed.
"We're all doing everything we
"There's not a bulletin getting ready to go out this afternoon to change walls at race tracks or roll bars in race cars."
Mike Helton NASCAR president
can go to make the sport as safe as it can be," said Kyle Petty, whose son, Adam, was the first of four NASCAR drivers to die in ontrack accidents in the past two years.
"As long as we're running at high rates of speed, though, racing is never going to be 100 percent safe. That's just a fact of our sport. As long as everybody is working to make it as safe as it
can be, I don't know that we can ask for much more."
Meanwhile, no concrete reason for Earnhardt's death came out of the report, which cost NASCAR more than $1 million.
Dr. James Raddin, one of the lead investigators, said the conclusion of the report is that "there were a number of factors in which the timing came together" to cause Earnhardt's death.
Raddin said one finding was that Earnhardt's left lap belt broke from the force of slamming into the concrete wall at about 160 mph, allowing the driver to be flung farther forward and to the right than if the entire five-point seat-belt harness had remained intact.
Earnhardt was thrown to the right, and his fatal injuries apparently came when his head turned, his helmet rotated on his head, and the left rear of his skull was left bare to hit the side of the steering wheel, the rear of the seat
or both,the report said.
In finding that the fracture started with a blow to the back of the head, Raddin disagreed with a court-appointed, independent medical examiner who determined the fracture was caused by a violent head whip.
That examiner, Dr. Barry Myers of Duke, studied Earnhardt's autopsy photos and concluded earlier this year that seatbelt failure "does not appear to have played a role" in his death
As for the seat belt, Raddin ruled out that it was cut by rescue workers as they tried to remove Earnhardt from the battered car. Five days after the fatal crash, NASCAR said a broken seat belt had been found in the car.
"The physical evidence is clear," said Raddin, who displayed a blown up photo of Earnhardt's seat belt. "This was not a cutting of a belt afterward. This was a belt that separated under load."
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