By David Morgan, Associate Editor
For the past six weeks, Alex Bowman has been sitting on the sidelines as he battled vertigo, but makes his return to the cockpit of the No. 48 Hendrick Motorsports Chevrolet this weekend at Bristol Motor Speedway.
Bowman began experiencing vertigo symptoms during the March 1 race at Circuit of the Americas, which forced him to exit the car during the race and cede the seat over to a relief driver and has been away from the race track in the weeks since as he worked to get his health back in order.
“Yeah, obviously COTA wasn’t a lot of fun for me,” said Bowman. “Everything was fine until it wasn’t, obviously, in the car; dizziness, throwing up on myself, spinning, kind of all of the things. It wasn’t fun, and I was not pumped that I had to get out.
“Obviously, I’ve raced through a lot of injuries, but was one where I was going to end up running into something or somebody, and the smart thing to do in that case was to get out.
“So, yeah, just spent a lot of time with a lot of different doctors and had a lot of different help to go about the best rehab process possible and kind of best practices going forward and everything to get back to where I needed to be to get back in the car.”
Bowman admitted that when he first climbed out of the car in Austin, he had doubts that he’d be able to return, but expressed his thanks to everyone for working with him to get back to being able to race again.
“When I got out at COTA, I was like, this is probably it. That was what was going through my head. So, yeah, that sucked, and I’m thankful that I got another shot at it.”
As part of his rehab, Bowman made laps at the Hendrick owned Ten-Tenths Motor Club outside of Charlotte Motor Speedway as well as simulator and pit stop practice to get him back in the best physical condition to be able to gain medical clearance to return.
“The biggest thing was not getting dizzy,” said Bowman. “I mean, that was the main thing, right? So, yeah, we had gone to Ten-Tenths there that first week. I could run a couple laps, but then I was ready to throw up and dizzy and not feeling well.
“Just being able to drive, put myself through those G-Forces and to feel well through it. You know, obviously did karting, pit practice, a ton of different workouts, interval stuff and different stuff with different doctors. So, yeah, feeling really good.”
In his absence, Anthony Alfredo and Justin Allgaier participated in the four races he missed, with Allgaier expected to continue his relief driver role before Bowman gained his clearance to get back in the car at Bristol.
With the heavy physical demands that Bristol puts on a driver, Bowman was asked why he chose to return at the high-banked half-mile, he responded with his typical humor.
“Because they said I could,” Bowman said with a laugh. “I mean, yeah, I’m a racecar driver, so you tell me I’m clear and I’m going to go do it.
“Yeah, it’s probably the worst place possible to come back to. You know, I think not just from it’s physical, but it’s a track that is extremely difficult. The margins from the front to the back of the field are tiny. You look at qualifying here, and every hundredth is multiple spots, for the most part. I haven’t qualified a car in a month. I’m trying to get back up to speed.
“My expectations coming here, it’s one of my best tracks; two of the last three poles here, expect to contend for wins. I think expectations probably change a little bit this week. You know, if we could get out of here with a top-10, top-15, I think, on my side of things, I’d be happy. But I think today will be the hardest part, just getting back up to speed and trying to qualify after sitting on the couch.”
Jeff Andrews, Hendrick Motorsports President and General Manager, added his thoughts on the No. 48 team having full faith in Bowman’s return.
“Alex Bowman has always been the driver of the No. 48 Ally Chevrolet, and we never had questions about whose seat that was,” said Andrews. “I think we said that early on, that we would follow 100% of the medical guidelines that we were given, and then plan Alex’s return when it was medically cleared, and then as well when Alex said he was ready.
“For us, Alex is part of our team. He’s a key teammate for us and has been an integral part of our company for quite some time, so we were willing to do what we needed to do to wait for him and get him back, and at the right time. I think it’s a testament to Alex with how hard he worked to be back a week early. I mean, these guys are athletes and there’s a lot of stories out there about athletes working hard and overcoming adversity and getting back in racecars sooner than expected.
“We’re happy to have him back; proud of the work he put in, ready to go racing here these next 19 weeks and we’ll see where the points fall.”
Andrews added that the team will not have a relief driver on standby this weekend and will be treating his first weekend back as business as usual.
“I would say from our perspective, Alex has been cleared without any restrictions, so we do not have a backup driver on call this weekend. We’re approaching it as a normal weekend and looking forward to 500 laps on Sunday.”
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