Ryan Briscoe was screaming down Chicagoland Speedway at speeds near 200 mph when his right front tire ticked the car driven by Alex Barron. Briscoe's car shot airborne, nose skyward like a rocket, then pancaked into the wall, a flaming hulk throwing off fiery shrapnel.

Briscoe is a walking, talking miracle. He not only survived that fireball four years ago -- dubbed the Briscoe Inferno -- but is one of the top three racers in the IndyCar series, whose champion will be crowned this weekend in Homestead.

There are many more like him, drivers who endured unimaginably violent crashes and lived to race again. For that they can thank engineers who have made dramatic gains in improving the safety of race cars and the tracks they drive on.

``It's our responsibility, as a governing body, to make the sport as safe as we can,'' said Les Mactaggart, the IndyCar Racing League's senior technical director. ``It's several times safer than it has been.''

Track deaths can be like hurricanes -- coming in spurts, followed by droughts -- but statistics appear to back up Mactaggart's claim. Throughout the 1990s, auto racing experienced between 1.5 and two on-track deaths per year, according to Dean Sicking, a professor of structural engineering at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln and a leading expert in car safety.

But since 2001, NASCAR's three major series have seen no fatalities.

The turning point was the Feb. 8, 2001, death of Dale Earnhardt in the Daytona 500. Not just any racer, he was arguably the Michael Jordan of his sport, and his death came in NASCAR's premier event, in the final lap, no less.

Adding to the shock: Unlike the fiery crash that Briscoe survived, Earnhardt's wreck looked like a fairly routine Interstate 95 collision with the outer wall, albeit at high speed. His car stayed intact. But what wasn't seen -- Earnhardt's unrestrained head, flailing free, whipped forward, which resulted in a cracked skull -- was what killed him. His was NASCAR's fourth death due to skull fractures in a little over a year.

(Counterintuitively, the dramatic wrecks that scatter pieces of the car across the track -- like the one that Briscoe endured at Chicagoland, suffering two broken clavicles, scorched lungs and back injuries -- are often more survivable. The energy dissipates with the wreckage, hopefully sparing the driver.

``I was extremely lucky it wasn't worse,'' said the 28-year-old Aussie.)

That series of fatalities that culminated in Earnhardt's death prompted NASCAR to mandate the use of the HANS (Head And Neck Support) Device or similar Hutchens Device in October of 2001. The harness, worn outside of the helmet, provides support to the head and reduces the likelihood of injury.

``It was a very, very positive move, a big improvement in safety,'' Sicking said.

IndyCar does not have a rule forcing drivers to wear the HANS because one was unnecessary -- every driver has always used it, according to a spokeswoman for the circuit.

SAFETY BY DESIGN

Scientists and many drivers believe the HANS device has reduced racing fatalities, but they also cite other factors: the advent of effective energy absorbers in racetracks' outer walls, the reinforcement of the cars themselves with new, stronger metals, and more secure cockpits.

``A lot of it has to do with design,'' Tom Gideon, NASCAR's director of safety initiatives. ``There are so many factors that have to come together, but the No. 1 reason for decreased fatalities is restraining the drivers and keeping them in the seat.''

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