DAYTONA BEACH, Fla. (AP) — Lying on the ground with a broken right leg, NASCAR driver Brad Keselowski was in so much pain that he briefly contemplated taking a Civil War approach to his injury.
“What was going through my mind was like, ’Oh my God. Think about the soldiers in the Civil War,'" Keselowski said during Daytona 500 media day Wednesday. "They just would cut their leg off right here. And I understood why they would do it because it hurt so bad.
It was by far the worst pain I’ve ever went through.
“I get why they would bring out the hacksaw. There was part of me that’s like, ‘That might actually feel better.’”
Keselowski suffered the injury when he slipped on ice during a family ski vacation in mid-December. He had surgery a day later and spent weeks rehabbing. He missed the exhibition Clash last week at Bowman Gray Stadium in Winston-Salem, North Carolina.
He passed a driving test Monday at Charlotte Motor Speedway and was cleared to get behind the wheel in the No. 6 Ford for RFK Racing. He was using a cane — complete with sponsor decals, of course — to get around Daytona International Speedway on Wednesday.
“It’s hard to explain to people that have never broken their femur before what it’s like,” said Keselowski, the 2012 Cup Series champion. “It’s not the same as breaking your leg below your knee. Your femur is the biggest bone in your body. It’s got a lot of things running through it, and it has to heal. You can’t really cast it. You can’t do any of those things.
“You just kind of have to tough it out.”
Keselowski said a full recovery will take roughly six months. He added that he won’t know how he will handle the pain until he drives a 60-lap qualifying race Thursday. The toughest part is getting in and out of the car window.
“I’m eight weeks in, and until about three-to-five weeks in, there was a question if I was going to walk again, let alone drive a race car,” he said. “Those were the thoughts that were going through my mind. I was confident I was going to put the work in, and I was going to own whatever result there was.
“There were certainly a lot of moments where you’re like, ‘Ooh, this isn’t a layup.’ … But until you get in a race car going 190 miles an hour, you don’t know. You don’t know how it’s going to feel.”
Joey Logano has a new look for the Daytona 500. Fittingly, he’s calling it hair-o-dynamics.
Logano showed up at NASCAR’s season opener sporting a bald head, a significant change for the 35-year-old Team Penske driver. Just three years ago, Logano had voluminous black locks courtesy of a sponsor that treated him for alopecia and early baldness. The procedure gave him a full head of hair for the first time in a decade.
Now, he’s taken a 180-degree turn.
“You can do this haircut at home,” Logano quipped.
He said the autoimmune disease causes random bald patches that take time to come back. He had a flare-up in the offseason and responded, “Screw it. I’m just shaving it all off.” He handed clippers to his 9-year-old son, Hudson, and said “Have at it.”
“I figured he would have fun doing that,” Logano added.
Following the suggestion of his wife, Brittany, Logano decided to grow out facial hair to even out his new look.
Bubba Wallace danced his way through Bad Bunny’s Super Bowl halftime show and then took to social media to praise the performance.
“What a proud moment it must be for the Puerto Rican community!! I enjoyed that,” he posted.
He received a handful of negative responses, but as the only Black driver racing full-time at NASCAR’s top level, Wallace felt a connection to Bad Bunny’s moment on a global stage.
“I didn’t understand a word that he was saying, but I put myself in the Puerto Rican shoes, tried to, and I was like, ‘Holy cow, this is probably really big for them.’ And that brought me a lot of joy. And I may have been moving a little bit having a beer or two, you know.”
Despite not understanding the Spanish lyrics, Wallace understood he was watching a cultural moment at a difficult time in the United States.
“We’re in such a divisive country right now, and it’s sad. And to see how music brings people together, it’s like, ‘We need help, you know?’ I don’t know where that starts," Wallace said. "I’m not trying to become political about it at all, but I just I enjoyed it because I know millions of other people that have never been able to be on the big stage did, and that’s a really cool moment. It’s as simple as that. It was coming from the heart.”
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