On most nights, the young drivers racing carts around the Pole Position Raceway would be thrilled to see Sam Schmidt enter the building. Maybe they could show off their skills and catch the eye of the Indy Lights and Indy Car team owner.

But tonight, Schmidt came to Pole Position Raceway under much sadder circumstances… to address the media after his driver Dan Wheldon died yesterday on lap 11 of the Izod World Championships at Las Vegas Motor Speedway.

“It’s been an unbelievable 24 hours and I’m still in a bit of shock,” a somber Schmidt told  the assembled media. “I got to know him away from the track and to hear the love he had for his wife and family…they were always on his brain.”

Wheldon died on lap 11 of Sunday’s race, Schmidt took time to comment on news reports and comments by NASCAR driver Jimmie Johnson that the Las Vegas Motor Speedway, and ovals in general are not safe for safe for Indy Cars. “Everyone is entitled to their opinion, but there have been incidents on slow corners at street courses.  Racers are racers, they are going to push the envelope wherever they are.” Schmidt added, “I don’t think you can blame the track.”

Schmidt did say that Indy Car officials will have to take a hard look at safety and do a lot of testing with the new car (Indy Car will introduce a new body and car in 2012) before the series returns to Las Vegas Motorspeedway.   Asked if Wheldon had expressed any concern over large size of the field Schmidt said, “No, he didn’t express any concern (for safety) other than there would be six or seven more cars to pass.”

“It’s difficult to find a silver lining in all of this, but he (Wheldon) was having fun. Right before he got in the car he was confident…. his last words on the radio were “”Let’s go, I’m ready to go for this thing, we can win this thing.”” Schmidt said when asked about Wheldon’s attitude before the race. “He passed 10 cars on the first 10 laps…he was having fun.”

Schmidt had only worked with and known Wheldon over the past year.  “Unlike some of the other teams, I’ve only been around him around 6 months.  But in that short time I’ve saw what an unbelievable individual Dan was. It wasn’t an act with him (Wheldon) he was very genuine.  For Dan it never got old, he would go out of his way to put a smile on a kid’s face.  People wanted to be around him.”

Schmidt said it’s been a range of emotions in the past 24 hours.  Asked if this incident would make him consider getting out of the sport, Schmidt said, “I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t.”

In 2000, Schmidt became a quadriplegic due to injuries in a practice crash in Orlando Florida.  He said the parallels between he and Dan at the time he was hurt were too many. “It’s one thing to take the risk yourself and my situation, it’s something I was doing since I was 5 years old and I’m still here to watch my kids grow up. It’s an amazing parallel between Dan’s age and my age when I got hurt and the ages of his kids.  I just don’t know if I can be this tightly associated with something like that in the future.”