RIP Dan Wheldon and Hold Close Those You Love

I have yet to talk about my love for racing on here. To some it may seem odd this obsession I have with watching things go fast because I don’t drive myself, I’ve never driven a vehicle farther than from one end of a street to another when I was 16 and while nothing bad happened I just felt that driving wasn’t for me…20 years later I still feel that way and have no desire to drive, in fact as I got older it turned more and more into a fear I guess, one that I’m ok with not overcoming. I also have an extreme hatred for people who drive poorly and don’t obey the speed limit. But I love, love, love watching the sport of racing. My favorite is Nascar, though I could(and do) watch anything race and love it.

I don’t catch very many Indy car races(I don’t follow it as closely as I do Nascar) but I knew there should be one on today and I was pretty sure it was the last race of the season. Just as I was going to turn the TV on to see if it was on a channel I get I looked at my Twitter to see a tweet from Samantha Busch(Nascar driver Kyle Busch’s wife) that there had been a big wreck at the Indy race. I found the channel the race was on and learned that there had indeed been a very big wreck, 15 cars involved on only the 12th lap of the race. One of the drivers involved was Dan Wheldon, a very popular driver, 2 time winner of the Indy 500…including this years win, and winner of the Indy Championship in 2005.

Wheldon was immediately airlifted to hospital. For the next 2 hours there were lots of interviews with other drivers as the race was red flagged, there was word on everyone involved in the wreck….except Wheldon. After some time the drivers were all summoned to a meeting….I’m sure I was only one of many who felt sick waiting, knowing that no word and a meeting being called likely meant bad news and they wanted to break the news to the drivers before announcing it to the public. After the meeting finally let out it was hard to read the faces on most of the drivers, except Tony Kanaan who was apparently one of the drivers closest to Wheldon. He understandably was having difficulty holding back his emotions and watching him made us pretty sure the news was bad, very bad.

Sadly, the announcement everyone had been hoping and praying wouldn’t come did. The Indy racing family, and more importantly the Wheldon family had lost one of their own. At 33 years old Dan Wheldon race car driver and more importantly husband and father of 2 little boys was gone. The drivers and Indy officials decided that they would not finish the race and would instead do 5 laps in honor of Dan Wheldon. With Wheldon’s crew lined up alongside the track, Wheldon’s car number 77 the only number lit up atop the scoring board, and the rest of the Indy racing family and extended family lined up on pit road, the cars that were still remaining took 5 incredibly emotional laps around the track.

I think I find myself so incredibly emotional over the death of Dan Wheldon not only because of my love and respect for the sport and those involved in it, but because he was so young and left behind a young family. He was only a few years younger than I am and he had a wife and two very young sons. My heart aches and is absolutely breaking for his wife and boys, the youngest being only a matter of months old.

There are still 2 other drivers in hospital because of the wreck, both are awake and alert and are being kept overnight, but it sounds like they will both be ok. My thoughts are with them for a quick recovery, and with the entire racing world for the strength to get through this tragedy.

Dario Franchitti would have been crowned the Championship winner today, and while he is still the winner there was no celebration. It should be a great celebration for Franchitti, but how do you celebrate when something so horrible happened? Franchitti’s win was confirmed because of the accident, his only competition for the win, Will Power, was involved in the accident.

Treasure each and every day with those you love because as much as we don’t like to think about it, you never know when tragedy can strike. I know I gave my husband an extra tight hug before he left for work tonight and I’ll be giving my kids and extra tight hug when I send them off to bed for the night….and be grateful for my life and hope I’m lucky enough to never have to go through losing a loved one at a young age.

RIP DanWheldon, you will be missed.

Jolene