IMSA: Veteran engineer Mathis moved to hospice care

Open-wheel and sports car engineer Ron Mathis has been moved to hospice care after spending almost a month in the intensive care unit of a Southern California hospital. Mathis, a native of England, was struck by a car on Sept. 15 while riding home from work and suffered multiple broken bones, internal injuries, and head trauma.

Mathis was placed in an induced coma during his time in ICU, and according to the latest updates from his wife Cindy, he's been moved to a hospice facility. Despite making slight progress at various points while in the ICU, it's unclear whether the warm-hearted Briton will recover.

This writer worked under Mathis as a junior engineer at the Hogan Racing CART IndyCar team in the late 1990s and appreciated his skill for engineering fast and complicated machines. Years later, his work as a race engineer during Audi Sport's dominant reign in the American Le Mans Series – with the twin-turbodiesel V12-powered R10s in particular – proved to be a perfect match for his innate curiosity.

"We flew the entire 2008 season together all across the country in his little plane and I always enjoyed those journeys," said veteran Audi engineer Brad Kettler. "He was on our R10 project and was just so incredibly bright. His inquisitiveness was amazing and the thoroughness to work until he understood something was what separated him from the others. He would not let a problem beat him.

"At the same time, he's also really warm and appreciative of history, engineering history, and some engineers are so dry they don't pull any inspiration from the cars they work on, but he did. He's so well rounded; his knowledge about planes, trains, hydroelectric dams... Those flights with Ron, just the two of us for hours, made for fascinating conversations just listening to the things he understood and fed into his work."

Kettler also recalls his friend's ability to deliver significant improvements back to the Audi Sport base in Ingolstadt, Germany.

"The Germans didn't always understand Ron's way of thinking, but he was able to make powerful suggestions on how to improve the car – very innovative ways to fix some kinematic problems – at a time with the R10 when they said it was as good as it could be," he added. "He was one of few who could out-engineer Ingolstadt. His mind never stopped. Being on the pole was good, but he was always searching for the next thing we could do to be faster. Ron's drive was a big motivational factor for us."

Among the many cars Mathis engineered, he found great pleasure in the challenge and creative freedom that came with developing Chris Rado's 1400hp front-wheel-drive Scion time attack tC. The unhinged vehicle employed cartoonish aerodynamics – all inspired by Ron's pro racing experience – to keep the car glued to the ground as it shattered records from coast to coast.

With the costs incurred in the ICU and those that will accrue at the hospice facility, a GoFundMe page has been created to assist the Mathis family mounting medical bills.

"I'm gutted by what's going on," Kettler said. "It doesn't look good and he's been this way for a while. Helping Cindy and his son Simon however we can is the least we can do for Ron."