Dario Franchitti's No. 40 Dodge is left a crumpled wreck after being t-boned at high speed by Larry Gunselman on Saturday at Talladega. The heavy framing of the stock cars prevented more than a broken ankle for the Scottish star, in his rookie stock car season. (Dale Davis/Associated Press)

Dario Franchitti picked up the phone in Alabama Sunday morning, and found his wife, actress Ashley Judd, on the line from Africa.

She hadn't heard about her husband's little incident on Saturday in the Nationwide stock car event at Talladega.

"She said 'Are you OK?' and I said 'I broke my ankle' and she said 'Oh.'

"She's cool."

Judd spends all her available time at the race track whenever Franchitti is racing, qualifying or practising, but Saturday's wreck was perhaps one best avoided.

Just 10 laps into the race for NASCAR's main support series, Franchitti had a rear tire explode, sending his car into the outside wall and then down the track.

That's a moment oval drivers in any series dread — sliding sideways down the banked surface while the cars roaring his way have yet to reduce speed under the yellow flag.

Sure enough, just as Franchitti's Dodge made it to the apron he was t-boned in the driver's door by Larry Gunselman.

"I thought I was OK, and thought 'Those guys did a good job of missing me,'" Franchitti said. "Then I got KO'd."

It was a frightening crash, causing a broken ankle that will keep the Scottish-born driver out for at least two weeks.

And it brought back memories of Alex Zanardi, who had the front of his Champ car — and his legs —taken off by a speeding Alex Tagliani in Germany seven years ago. Franchitti was in that race and at the hospital afterwards.

That crash was in a much smaller, lower and less well-built open-wheel car, and it's part of the irony for Franchitti, the Indy 500 winner who switched to stock cars this year: that this type of accident happened now and not last season, especially since many have wondered whether he made the change out of safety concerns.

"I got asked that question a lot: 'Are you coming here because it's safer?' and I said 'No,' because if you are looking for something safe to do, do not drive a racing car," he said. "Racing is dangerous, whether it's NASCAR or Indy cars.

"Everyone is doing everything they can to make these things as safe as possible. Everybody is working hard to make these things safe, but racing isn't safe and we know that."

Franchitti, who returned to Talladega on Sunday with his left foot in a cast and bandage, said he knew things could have turned out much worse for him: "I'm very lucky these cars are as safe as they are."

For Gunselman, too. He walked away unharmed.

With files from Associated Press