NATIONAL Trans Am contender Ben Grice has opened up on the spectacular incident which took him out of the season-opener and the difficult aftermath which followed.
The second-generation racer was on his way to victory in the second leg of the Symmons Plains round in February when he was struck down by a driveline failure.
As he crawled onto the pit straight, he was collected by an unsighted James Simpson whose Dodge Challenger was launched skywards and into a rollover.
The damage to both cars was severe, and Grice has been forced into a car swap for Round 2 at Phillip Island as he strives to get his title campaign back on track.
That has only come after a rocky road to recovery.
“I got pretty much run over and hit in the driver’s seat, back of the head, it was pretty ordinary,” Grice reflected in a Stan Sport interview.
“It was like a bomb going off, it felt like I was sitting on top of a grenade; ears ringing, everything goes white and dizzy, and I had a bit of a nap there for a while.
“It was like trying to get out of bed when your alarm is just going off, it was a bit tough to wake up from that.”
Unsure whether he then passed out again in the paramedic ambulance, it was days later that Grice’s condition worsened.
“I felt okay on the Sunday, and the Tuesday it really hit me,” he said.
“I was a bit confused and getting lost and couldn’t drive home and stuff like that and then worked out I had a pretty reasonable concussion.
“It took a few weeks in a dark room to get over it, it was a pretty ordinary time, but thankfully Greg Crick, a recommendation from him got us into a good clinic and doing some good exercises to get back.
“I feel pretty good, I’m pretty excited about getting back in a car… these sorts of things can break people or they can bring them together and make them stronger so I’m sure it’s the latter for us.”
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Motorsport Australia launched an inquiry into the incident, prompting recommendations for improved processes.
Among findings was that “medical personnel failed to adequately care for the drivers of cars #03 and #782 in an appropriate manner including letting these drivers out of their care without fully appreciating that they were both potentially concussed.”
That led to a recommendation that a “rigorous concussion policy” be urgently developed to ensure drivers involved in such incidents are appropriately assessed and monitored and have a structured return to racing.
