WEST ALLIS, Wisconsin – That James Hinchcliffe is even alive today is remarkable considering the nature and extent of the life-threatening injuries he suffered in a crash at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway on May 18. That he was at a Verizon IndyCar Series race less than three weeks later for the Honda Indy Toronto on June 14 was even more surprising.
Hinchcliffe, admitting he has grown tired and bored laying around his Indianapolis home while he recovers from internal injuries that will keep him out of racing for the rest of this season, is at the Milwaukee Mile this weekend. Veteran IndyCar driver Ryan Briscoe will drive Hinchcliffe’s No. 5 Arrow Electronics Honda for the rest of this season.
Hinchcliffe appeared much thinner and paler than before his crash but, considering he nearly bled to death and is living off “someone else’s blood,” he’s just happy to be here.
“It's good to be seen,” Hinchcliffe said. “The recovery process has been a lot of PlayStation, the big decision every morning between how much time do I spend in bed versus how much time do I spend on the couch. In all honesty, it's been pretty smooth. I've been lucky. I've got a tremendous team of doctors and PTs (physical therapists) looking after me. They've really kind of helped the recovery process go along as smoothly as possible. We're kind of ahead of schedule on pretty much everything. Energy level gets better every day. Strength gets better every day. Mobility gets better every day.
“So it's been a lot of long days, not doing much, which, unfortunately, is what I've been told to do, and the few times I've disobeyed that order I've paid for it dearly. So I've learned the doctors kind of know what they're talking about and you should probably listen to them. And that's what I've been doing. It feels slow for my speed, but the doctors are telling me everything's going very quickly, so no complaints.”
Getting back to the racetrack even in a non-driving role is an important part of Hinchcliffe’s mental and emotional recovery. He has another surgery scheduled at the end of this month to correct damage to his lower digestive system before he can fully begin the rehabilitation process that will hopefully allow him to return to IndyCar racing in 2016.
Being at the track gives the driver from Oakville, Ontario added purpose.
“It’s painful but necessary,” Hinchcliffe said. “I'm still as much a part of this team as I was driving behind the wheel. We're obviously still learning a new aero kit and we're going to all these tracks for the first time with the new aero kit so there are still lessons to be learned. As much as I can stay involved reading the engineering reports and getting everything after the fact, being there on hand at the time and hearing the words out of the drivers’ mouth and seeing the feelings and emotions and being part of the decision-making process is still something that will serve me, I think, very well in preparations for next year when we still have to use this same car.
“It’s all learning and building toward 2016 for me as well as trying to help the team and add my experience in whenever I can for the races this year.”
Hinchcliffe’s trip to Toronto from June 12-14 seemed rather ambitious but he made a concerted effort to keep himself from being overwhelmed and exhausted.
“The trip to Toronto was actually handled very well,” he said. “We obviously took a pretty strict stance on doing as little as possible, and I really appreciate and respect everybody from the teams and the fans and the media and everybody giving me that freedom.
“I've been very active in tracking my steps. That's one of the few things I can do is track how many steps I do. I've been getting to a certain number and that was kind of my goal for the day. The doctor wanted me to get moving. Toronto, I shot under on my steps all three days by a pretty significant margin because we went from the (motor coach) to the pit lane, from the bus to the pit lane and that was it. We kept it very low key and very low stress on me.
“Honestly, I felt really good after the weekend and was very glad that I was well enough and given permission to get out there and see it in person.”
Hinchcliffe is targeting a return to race next season but realizes there are no guarantees.
“I hope so,” he said. “Now that you've actually posed it, no one has actually asked me that question. But I think as far as the doctors are concerned, being ready for offseason testing shouldn't be a problem. I obviously still have one surgery to go, so some of the rehab and physical therapy is going to be more heavily weighted after that surgery. The big goal for the doctors was to make sure that I recovered as well as possible from not only the surgery that I had, but from the trauma that my body experienced to prepare for the next surgery to make sure I'm as healthy as I am the next time I go under the knife, so that way I can bounce back quickly from that one. So the physical side of it will take place more so after that is done.
“But mainly it's been working on mobility. Trying to keep the new blood flowing because clotting is obviously a worry and infection is a worry, so I've sort of taken care of those things. But, yeah, once we get out from the next one (surgery), that's when the real hard work starts.”
Hinchcliffe admitted he has disobeyed the doctor a few times in his recovery and realized afterwards it wasn’t such a great idea. For example, he went to a friend’s house to celebrate the Fourth of July and realized he probably should have done that.
“You can only spend so many days in the house on the couch,” Hinchcliffe said. “The world still goes on without you, and there are just times when you want to be part of the things that are happening, but ultimately my goal is to get back in the car as soon as possible. So anything that I have to do and anything that I've got to suffer through for that, we can do it.”
“Days spent resting can still be exhausting. There is still some pain that creeps in from time to time and dealing with that can certainly make a day worse than the previous or the next. So it's all a process. But I've been very fortunate, like I said, that I've had a lot of good people around me.”
And one of those is his Australian model girlfriend, Kirsten Dee, who has been at his side throughout this entire ordeal.
“My girlfriend has been a Godsend in all of this,” he admitted. “I think she's going more stir crazy than I am because she's perfectly able‑bodied and still stuck at home most of the time. But I've had a lot of help to get through those days.”
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