Head injuries most frightening of all

Thursday, May 14, 1998 | 6:47 a.m.

By MIKE HARRIS

AP Motorsports Writer

You can't see it. There's no scar, no cast, no limp. A race driver can deal with those things.

But a head injury is perhaps the most frightening and mystifying of all. Three-time Winston Cup champion Darrell Waltrip knows that better than most.

He came away from a 1983 Daytona 500 crash with a severe concussion. He drove the next week at Richmond, but later admitted he didn't remember the race.

"It's a pretty scary thing to have to deal with when you can't see it healing or getting better," the 51-year-old driver said. "You just don't want to believe it's really happening to you.

"Other than being burned, I worry most of all about concussions and things like that."

A severe head injury in 1988 ended Bobby Allison's long and brilliant career.

"It's not like a broken leg or arm or something like that," Allison said. "You take a knock to your head and you can lose memory and a lot more than that.

"When that happens, it's all over. You can't race without all your abilities."

Ricky Craven walked away from a crash in April 1997 at Texas with bumps, bruises and a severe concussion. He considered himself lucky.

Now, more than a year and a couple more crashes later, he is going through a slow recuperation from post-concussion syndrome, something that doctors can diagnose but can't do much about.

It's different in every case. Some people with multiple concussions can go on with their lives without problem. Others, like Craven, find their life has changed.

"I didn't know for sure that anything was wrong," he said. "I just didn't feel quite right, and I couldn't pin it down."

It's a difficult thing to deal with in a 3,400-pound stock car at speeds approaching 200 mph.

A 31-year-old man with a wife and two children, Craven saw the need to get some answers. He went to a doctor and found out the only sure cure was rest.

To his great regret, Craven had to step away from his ride with the elite Hendrick Motorsports team, moving to the sidelines for a minimum of three months.

"Man, that's tough," Waltrip said. "You can get in and drive a race car when you've got a cast on. A lot of us have done it. But to walk away from your ride in the middle of a season, especially when you don't really feel injured, is real hard."

Buddy Baker, whose career ended because of a head injury, admires Craven's decision.

"If you know you're not 100 percent, this is the wrong profession to be in," Baker said.

Craven can do without such praise.

"Wrecking is an element of the sport," he said. "The type of abuse our bodies take is not what they were built for. ... The problems I was having (on the track) were little ones. For everyday, normal stuff, I'm fine.

"It's the little extra things I take from my senses that make me a race car driver that weren't quite what I needed."

But Craven says race drivers don't ever want to admit anything is wrong.

"I started with Hendrick in '97 and I was real excited about the opportunity," he explained. "My whole focus had been on getting a Winston Cup ride where I had the chance to win races. That becomes your total focus. You ignore things like an achy back or a headache because you want to get to that win so bad."

His problems peaked on March 1 at Las Vegas, where he began to have vision problems.

"When my windshield got dirty there, I had a hard time concentrating and focusing," Craven said.

A week later at Atlanta, the sight problem persisted, and Craven decided it was time to seek medical help. After tests at the University of North Carolina, Craven was advised to get out of the race car.

He is undergoing therapy for both the concussion and knee surgery he decided to have while sidelined.

The waiting and wondering is excruciating for Craven, who began a driving as a teen-ager.

"The doctors tell me I'm probably going to be fine, back to normal," he said. "I really can't wait to get back in the race car. But there are no guarantees.

"The thing is, you can't go out there and do what we as race drivers do if you're not 100 percent. If you do that, you're taking an awful risk for yourself, your family and those other guys out there. I don't want to be in that position."