"Slack Kills" is what F1 drivers say. They walk away from 200mph impacts because they are wearing seatbelts. That allows the crumple-zones to perform their job and dissipate the forces
Well, they are tightly strapped into form-fitting carbon fibre seats. They also wear carbon fibre helmets - which can withstand a 55 ton tank driving over them there is an article in Race Tech magazine on the latest helmet standard.
An F1 driver sits in a completely rigid carbon fibre 'tub' - which also contains the kevlar fuel bladder. The back of his seat butts onto the fuel bladder. It is the best place for it - keep the volatile fuel within the safety cell.
There are crumple zone structures - there are two carbon fibre 'tubes' at the sides which are side impact crash tubes, and the rain light to the rear of the gearbox is on a short crash structure.
The front nose is also crash tested, and should deform to absorb energy. Search for the video online of the US F1 nose undergoing a crash test. US F1 claimed this was their nose passing a test - most people who saw that had severe doubts on that score, it looks a failure.
YouTube
- US F1 Team - Nose Crash Test
The padding round the cockpit rim is I suppose a type of crash structure - it is removable within a certain number of seconds so the driver can be extracted.
Your basic point is true - the driver is fixed into a rigid structure, which is tested to survive a very major impact - hence you see those dramatic shots of cars with the front torn off etc.
Also of interest are the wheel tethers - wheels and hubs are tied onto the chassis, to prevent loose wheels flying off at high speed and hitting another car.