Being racing wife not so easy

Hank Kurz Jr

Thursday, Sept. 21, 2000 | 11:05 a.m.

Standing to the side as her husband answered questions about the time he almost died, Cathy Carelli dabbed tears from her eyes.

Her husband had just won a race, but suddenly the pain of the last 16 months came rushing back.

"I love racing as much as he does," she said. "I've been around it since I was a little kid. My dad and grandpa dragged me to the races, so that's all I've ever known."

On May 8, 1999, her commitment to the sport was severely tested.

It was then that Cathy saw her husband, NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series driver Rick Carelli, slam hard into the wall during the Memphis 200. He was near death from a skull fracture.

He left the track in a helicopter, paramedics working furiously.

"I talked to them before they airlifted him. I knew it was serious, but I didn't want to think the worst," Cathy said. "The first day that we were in the hospital, every doctor that walked out said, 'I need to prepare you because people don't live through this."'

But Rick seemed different. Twenty-four hours after the crash, the airlift crew stopped by his room and offered some encouragement.

"They said 'You know what? Somebody that was as coherent as he was - he's a fighter and he's going to make it,"' Cathy remembered.

After four days, things had calmed down considerably until doctors took him for an MRI, which they'd been doing every other day.

"As soon as they came back down, we had a room full of people again so I knew something had happened," she said. "I said, 'Now what?"'

He had artery damage, the doctors said, and an operation wouldn't help. All Carelli could do was wait for a stroke that seemed inevitable.

"That was probably the only time I think I lost it," she said.

But after filling out "Do Not Resuscitate" forms, Carelli began to improve. Eleven days later, an arteriogram showed the artery was healing on its own. Two months later, no evidence of the damage remained.

But the fight was far from over.

Rick had no brain damage or even brain bruising from the crash, but he continued to have "crooked eyes" and double vision.

"Every day I'd wake up hoping I wouldn't see four bed posts," he said. "You just keep hoping and believing."

One day, he was staring into a mirror and for the first time saw both eyes looking back. His vision was returning.

Now, the unspoken fears of a racing wife were about to come true.

"That one day when he woke up and his eyes weren't crossed, he looked over at me and said, 'I hope you know I'm going to try and get back into something and just see what I can do,"' Cathy recalled. "And I said, 'OK, I can support you. I'm glad you told me now."'

Thinking back, Cathy said she'd avoided the subject of her husband returning to racing to protect them both.

"I didn't want to deal with what his answer might be," she said.

She also didn't want to confront him with the possibility that his eyes might not get better and that he wouldn't be able to race again.

In November, Rick got a chance to run a test for a ride, and Cathy's fears came back like it was May all over.

"I didn't think I was going to make it," she said. "But his third lap out was about two-tenths slower than what he'd qualified in in April.

"I knew then what he was going to do."

Rick admits thinking during his recovery about what he would have done if he couldn't race again. He'd worked as a crew chief and did some TV commentary, but said when doctors cleared him to return, the decision was easy.

"It's all I've done for 20-some years," he said after winning this month at Richmond International Raceway. "You get around it, it's hard to leave. I wasn't going to stay on my porch and stop living."

Carelli passed Kurt Busch for the lead with 21 laps to go, the first time he had led all season. Then he held off Busch and Greg Biffle for his first victory since the crash.

Gushing with pride and overcome by the strain 16 months had brought, Cathy cried. Her life as a racing wife was changed again.

"I keep hoping it will get easier," she said.