There was certainly a lot going on with Greg Biffle during last Sunday night's Coca-Cola 600 at Charlotte Motor Speedway. His problems with the cooling unit in his No. 16 Ford were well chronicled during the race, including the tirades over his team radio. He held the lead late in the race but was forced to pit for fuel and finished 13th.
As it turned out, there was a lot more going on with Biffle than what he shared over the radio. Biffle was a guest on Claire B. Lang's show "Dialed In" on Wednesday night on Sirius XM NASCAR Radio and went into deep detail about what he was experiencing in the car and the after effects he was still feeling on Wednesday afternoon.
Here are some excerpts from Biffle's interview:
"The cool box malfunctioned somehow and it was burning up and it was heating the air so the air blowing in my helmet was really burning the side of my head, my ear and my face. I could feel my face turning orange. It was so hot. ...
"It showed 155 degrees inside the car. With about 40 to 50 laps to go, my eyeballs started hurting from the carbon monoxide and exhaust. I had pretty bad carbon monoxide poisoning and I was on oxygen for a while. My hydration level was really OK. Why it took half the race to fix it - things begin compiling to where your frustration level starts to escalate. We should be better than this. ...
"The side of my head is red. It felt like I had a rubber band around my forehead and above my ears and around the back. They call it a low pressure headache. I checked my blood pressure and it was 90/48. I probably should have gone to the hospital. I've never seen a blood pressure that low. My blood pressure started coming back (up) about 3 a.m. I killed a few brain cells, made it through it, almost won. ...
"They were going to have to tow it to pit road and taking me to the infield care center unconscious if I wasn't in the car any more. That was the only way they were going to get me out. I wasn't going to give up. I was not going to leave voluntarily. We were laps from winning that race. ..."
I'm not a huge fan of biffle, but I have to say I am very impressed he stuck it out through that. Carbon monoxide poisoning is serious business for race car drivers, and with it being damn near a sealed cockpit for these aero-sensitive tracks the health of these drivers is depending on that little carbon filter and helmet cooling.
ReplyDeleteThe fact that it was increasing temperature of the outside air... most drivers would have pulled in and gone laps down.