Busch feeling good about HANS, but not the COT

RICHMOND, Va. -- When the HANS device that was designed to keep his head immobilized during an accident suffered a malfunction as unexpected as the wreck itself, driver Kyle Busch literally took matters into his own hands during last Saturday's Busch Series race at Talladega Superspeedway.

"I cracked my visor and grabbed ahold of where the visor comes down right around the chin strap, so my fingers were inside, my palms out," Busch said.

"It was spur of the moment. I wanted to grab ahold of my head ... There was nothing to grip, so I had to crack my visor in order to get my fingers in there."

About that time, Busch went upside down on a wild ride (watch video) that included several barrel rolls before he finally ended upright, his car smoking and in multiple broken pieces. Busch said that it all seemed to be happening in slow motion in his mind's eye, and he wondered when it was all going to end -- and how it was going to come to an end.

His worst fears were not realized. He walked away and ended up with only widespread soreness in the way of injuries.

"I was a little sore Sunday getting back in the car [for the Nextel Cup race], but on Monday I was back at the gym just as normal," he said.

After the fact, and upon further review of the wild wreck, that seemed like something of a miracle.

"When I was sliding upside down on my roof, I was like, 'I don't know when this thing is going to stop, but I hope it stops before it wears through the roll bars,'" Busch said Friday, as he prepared for Saturday's Nextel Cup race at Richmond International Raceway. "It was a rough ride. ... Even holding on as much as you could, you still got bounced around and tossed around. It went along a lot faster on the video than it did in real life."

Busch said that he is convinced that his HANS device did its job during his horrific tumble through the grass and down the track at Talladega. He also said that NASCAR took the HANS device from his Hendrick Motorsports team after the race and sent it back to the manufacturer to investigate what might have went wrong with it.

"That's all I know. I didn't see it. I don't know what the crack [on it] looks like. I don't know where the crack was," he said. "But I've got full faith in them things because they've saved how many lives already?

"I'll keep wearing it, of course. It's mandated, but even if it wasn't I would keep wearing it anyway."

Busch said his bigger concern heading into the Richmond race is getting a handle on the Car of Tomorrow. Since winning the first COT race in NASCAR history at Bristol on March 25, when Busch was nonetheless highly critical of it, he has struggled to keep pace with Hendrick teammates Jeff Gordon and Jimmie Johnson in COT events, such as the one to be run at Richmond. (Continued)