(Photo credit: David Whealon) – Following a massive crash at Rockingham Dragway, racer Ronnie The King Davis has passed away from injuries sustained in the wreck. The crash happened on Saturday during qualifying at the PDRA Spring Nationals. Additionally, photographer and respected drag racing journalist Ian Tocher sustained major injuries when he was struck by debris from the crashing car which flew off of the racing surface and rolled multiple times, ending up reportedly hundreds of feet from the drag strip. Tocher’s injuries were concentrated on the lower half of his body and include severe trauma to his pelvis and legs. Recent Updates by Drag Illustrated Magazine seem to indicate that Tocher’s condition has stabilized and that orthopedic doctors believe that they can repair the damage to Tocher’s extremities.

King’s passing and Tocher’s injuries cast a pall over the drag racing world, especially in the community where Davis and Tocher were best known. The mood at the NMCA/NMRA event in Atlanta was drastically changed when word escaped and social media posts began to emerge with video of the crash (which we will not include here). Rumors regarding the condition of both Davis and Tocher started to circulate. Davis was one of the best top sportsman racers of all time having won five championships over the course of his career. He was one of the people that lobbied the NHRA very hard to include Top Sportsman as an official class and truly loved that form of drag racing. His nickname “the king” stemmed from his early career successes which dominated the local Georgia top sportsman scene. Outspoken and never afraid to share his opinion, Davis was a highly respected racer and had amassed a career that put him in rare air among the throngs that race fast, full-bodied cars. The impact of his crash and the news of his subsequent passing hit very hard among those Georgia based racers who had been competing with him or watching him compete for decades. To this point details and specifics of Davis’s injuries have not been published by a source that we trust enough to share from and as such we will not speculate.

Ian Tocher is a Canadian transplant, a hockey fan, a salt of the Earth guy, and one of the best drag racing journalists of the last several decades. Tocher found a great professional home in Drag Illustrated Magazine and has produced fantastic work from opinion columns to memorable features. Tocher has been a friend of BangShift since the beginning and has been a great source of tips on weird cars and other fun stories. This one hits very close to home. A Georgia resident, the accident was close enough to home that his wife and son were able to rush to his side and be with him in the dark hours following one of the worst crashes we have ever seen.

Positioned at the top end of the track for shooting photos, Tocher happened to be located in the exact spot that Davis hit after his car made an abrupt turn, spun, caught air, and took flight, landing on the other side of the wall with incredible momentum.

We’d like to extend our sincere condolences to the Davis family and our thoughts are with the Tocher family as they embark on a long road to heal Ian. The miracle is that he made it out out of there. While the arduous road to recovery is long, we know Ian is strong of will and will work hard to do everything in his power to heal and get back to the race track.