Veteran race car driver Jason Leffler died after an accident at Bridgeport Speedway in New Jersey Wednesday night. Leffler was competing in a heat race on the five-eighths-mile high banked dirt track when his winged sprint car appeared to break sending the car flipping onto the backstretch. Leffler had to be extricated from the car; he was immediately flown to a nearby trauma center where he was pronounced dead just after 9 p.m. EDT.
The Long Beach, Calif., native was 37 years old and leaves behind a five year son, Charlie.
Leffler started racing at the age of 12 and won four USAC titles before moving to NASCAR. There he raced for Joe Gibbs Racing, Chip Ganassi Racing, Turner-Scott Motorsports and last year for Kyle Busch Motorsports. In his NASCAR career he made 294 NASCAR Nationwide Series, 56 Camping World Truck Series and 73 Sprint Cup Series starts, winning two Nationwide series and one Truck series races. He raced in last weekend’s NASCAR Sprint Cup Series race at Pocono Raceway. He raced in the Indianapolis 500 in 2000 finishing 17th and was inducted into the National Midget Auto Racing Hall of Fame in 2003.
As the news of his passing spread fellow competitors and others in the industry began mourning his passing. MORE>>>
Greg is the author of "The Nuts and Bolts of NASCAR: The Definitive Viewers' Guide to Big-Time Stock Car Auto Racing" and has been published in major publications across the country including the Los Angeles Times, the Cleveland Plain Dealer and the Atlanta Journal-Constitution. He was also a contributor to Chicken Soup for the NASCAR Soul, published in 2010, and the Christmas edition in 2016. He wrote as the NASCAR, Formula 1, Auto Reviews and National Veterans Affairs Examiner for Examiner.com and has appeared on Fox News. He holds a BS degree in communications, a Masters degree in psychology and is currently a PhD candidate majoring in psychology. He is currently the weekend Motorsports Editor for Autoweek.
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