The HANS device was designed in the early 1980s by Dr. Robert Hubbard, a professor of biomechanical engineering at Michigan State University. Hubbard's interest in the problem stemmed from a conversation with his brother-in-law Jim Downing, an accomplished American road racer, following the death of a mutual friend in a testing accident. The predominant cause of driver fatalities at the time was basilar skull fracture — a catastrophic injury caused by violent head movement during a sudden stop, where the body is restrained by the seat belts but the head's momentum continues forward until the neck can no longer absorb the force.
Notable drivers who died from basilar skull fractures include Formula 1's Roland Ratzenberger, IndyCar's Scott Brayton, Bill Vukovich, and Greg Moore, and NASCAR's Adam Petty, Kenny Irwin Jr., and Dale Earnhardt. The injury was particularly prevalent in oval racing where high-speed frontal impacts into concrete walls were common.
Hubbard's first prototype was developed in 1985. Crash tests in 1989 using sleds and crash dummies with racing harnesses demonstrated that the HANS device reduced energy exerted on the head and neck by approximately 80 percent. Prior research had established injury thresholds at 740 pounds of vertical neck tension and 700 pounds of forward neck shear; the HANS device reduced both values to approximately 210 pounds.
The HANS device is shaped like a "U" made primarily of carbon fiber reinforced polymer. The back of the U rests behind the nape of the driver's neck, while the two arms lie flat along the top of the chest over the pectoral muscles. The device attaches only to the helmet — not to the belts, the driver's body, or the seat — using anchors on each side of the helmet. The driver's five- or six-point racing harness passes directly over the HANS device and buckles at the abdomen, securing the device via the driver's own body weight and the belts.
The purpose is to allow normal head movement in ordinary driving while preventing excessive movement in a crash. By maintaining the relative position of the head to the torso and transferring deceleration energy to the chest, shoulder, and belts, the device eliminates the whipping action responsible for basilar skull fractures.
Despite the device's effectiveness in testing, widespread adoption was slow. Hubbard and Downing formed Hubbard Downing Inc. in 1990 to manufacture and sell the HANS after major racing safety companies declined to produce it. The product attracted little industry interest until 1994, when Formula 1 showed interest following the deaths of Roland Ratzenberger and Ayrton Senna at the 1994 San Marino Grand Prix. The National Hot Rod Association became the first sanctioning body to adopt the device in 1996 following the death of Top Fuel driver Blaine Johnson.
Within NASCAR, resistance was strong. Dale Earnhardt — who would later die of a basilar skull fracture — referred to the device as "that damn noose" and claimed the tethers would more likely harm than save him. Mark Martin stated at Rockingham the weekend following Earnhardt's death in 2001 that he "would not wear one for anything."
The deaths of four NASCAR drivers in an eight-month span — Adam Petty in May 2000, Kenny Irwin Jr. in July 2000, Tony Roper in October 2000, and Dale Earnhardt on February 18, 2001 at the Daytona 500 — fundamentally changed NASCAR's position. On October 17, 2001, NASCAR mandated use of the HANS or a comparable device across its top three series. NASCAR switched to requiring the HANS device exclusively beginning in 2005. Formula 1 mandated HANS devices in 2003. The FIA made HANS compulsory for all international-level events from 2009 onward.
Quick-release shackles sourced from marine sailing rigging, developed by Ashley Tilling, improved driver acceptance by allowing simple one-pull extraction from the device — making emergency egress practical. Most major sanctioning bodies today mandate head and neck restraints meeting SFI Foundation Specification 38.1, a standard that encompasses the HANS and several certified alternatives.
Oval track racing had relied on reinforced concrete retaining walls as the primary boundary since the sport's early years. Concrete walls effectively protected spectators and rarely required significant maintenance, but their unforgiving rigidity transmitted enormous forces directly to drivers and cars during impacts. As speeds increased through the latter decades of the 20th century, the injury rates from concrete wall contact became increasingly unacceptable.
An early attempt to address the problem was the Polyethylene Energy Dissipating System (PEDS Barrier), developed by the Indy Racing League and retired GM engineer John Pierce at Wayne State University in 1998. The PEDS Barrier was installed at Indianapolis Motor Speedway for a trial during the 1998 Indianapolis 500. Its first significant real-world test came in the 1998 IROC race at Indy, when Arie Luyendyk spun into the barrier broadside. The violent impact ripped the PEDS components from the wall and scattered heavy debris across the track. A second version tested in 1999 revealed a "catch and pivot" tendency that caused the car to spin unpredictably after contact. The system was removed.
Following the PEDS Barrier's failures, Indianapolis Motor Speedway contacted the Midwest Roadside Safety Facility at the University of Nebraska–Lincoln in the fall of 1998. The resulting four-year research and development program, funded by the Indy Racing League, produced the SAFER Barrier, which was completed in spring 2002 and first installed at Indianapolis Motor Speedway in May 2002 in time for the Indianapolis 500.
The SAFER Barrier consists of structural steel tubes welded together in a flush-mounted panel, strapped to the existing concrete retaining wall. Bundles of closed-cell polystyrene foam are placed between the steel panel and the concrete wall. The steel structure distributes the energy of an impact along a longer section of wall, while the foam absorbs and dissipates a portion of the kinetic energy. The result is a meaningful reduction in the peak deceleration forces transmitted to the car and driver, and — critically — the car is redirected along the wall rather than bouncing violently back into oncoming traffic.
The design prioritized retrofittability to the wide variety of existing oval track walls across the country, each with different heights, curvatures, and construction standards. It also required the ability to be repaired quickly between sessions rather than causing lengthy delays after an impact. Its first real-world test came when driver Robby McGehee impacted the barrier during practice for the 2002 Indianapolis 500.
After successful deployment at Indianapolis, SAFER barriers began appearing at tracks nationwide. By 2006, every oval facility hosting an IRL IndyCar Series or NASCAR Sprint Cup Series event had SAFER barriers installed. Iowa Speedway became the first track in 2006 to install a purpose-built, free-standing SAFER barrier extending around the entire outer circumference of the track. Many facilities that initially installed the barriers only in the corners subsequently extended coverage to the entire perimeter and inside walls.
The technology later expanded to road and street circuits, where it is applied on high-speed cornering sections with limited runoff. Notable road course installations include Circuit de la Sarthe's Porsche Curves in 2016, the Baku City Circuit in 2016, and Circuit Zandvoort's Turn 14 in 2020.
Dean Sicking, who led the University of Nebraska team that developed the SAFER Barrier, received the National Science and Technology Medal from President George W. Bush in recognition of the work. The barrier and its developers also received the Louis Schwitzer Award, NASCAR's Bill France Jr. Award of Excellence, and the Autosport Pioneering and Innovation Award.
The HANS device and SAFER Barrier represent the two most impactful safety advances in NASCAR's modern history. Introduced within months of each other and mandated within a few years, they addressed the two primary mechanisms of oval racing fatalities — basilar skull fracture from unrestrained head movement, and massive impact forces from concrete walls — through engineering solutions rather than rule changes or speed restrictions. Both technologies subsequently spread across virtually every major motorsport sanctioning body worldwide, extending their influence far beyond the American stock car context in which they were developed.