Bowman vertigo not linked to prior concussions, team says

Alex Bowman had no warning before he began feeling ill last weekend at Circuit of The Americas, according to Hendrick Motorsports President Jeff Andrews, who says the cause of what was subsequently diagnosed as vertigo remains unclear.

“It’s very odd,” Andrews said Friday on SiriusXM NASCAR Radio. “No, there was nothing – there was no indication prior to the race. Several of us talked to Alex for quite a while, not only through the weekend but then again on Sunday. So, at some point during the race, this started to set in with him and became progressively worse.”

Bowman pulled his Chevrolet into the garage with about 24 laps to go, allowing the team to perform a driver change. Myatt Snider got in the car and finished the race as Bowman was taken to the infield care center, where he was seen and released. The swap came in the final stage after Bowman told his team he didn’t think he would be able to complete the race.

Blake Harris, Bowman’s crew chief, and the team left it in Bowman’s hands to make the decision. Because of where they were running on the racetrack, it would have made no difference if he pushed through to finish the race or if they did the driver change.

“I want to say one thing about Alex Bowman,” said Andrews. “We have watched him struggle his way through and fight his way through some race weekends when he was not feeling well and in a lot of pain, and this certainly was another level beyond that in terms of when it starts to affect your equilibrium and nausea that goes with that. I think he was willing to fight through that, but when it starts to affect your vision, that’s when the team said it was time to get out of the car, which absolutely killed him and crushed him.

“So, we knew when Alex Bowman was wanting to get out of a race car that we needed to find someone else to get in there.”

The vertigo diagnosis came after a few days of medical evaluation. Bowman then drove some exploratory laps in a road car around the Ten Tenths Motor Club road course near Concord, N.C. However, he will be sidelined for this weekend’s event at Phoenix Raceway because, although that drive went well, according to Andrews, Bowman didn’t feel ready to race. Instead, Anthony Alfredo will drive the car in Bowman’s place this weekend. Alfredo is the Hendrick Motorsports and Chevrolet sim driver.

One thing Andrews did discount was the suggestion that the vertigo issues developed from any of Bowman’s past injuries.

“It really has kind of come out of nowhere, so to speak,” Andrews said. “Alex has been seen and treated for some back and neck pain in the past, like I think most of these guys and ladies that strap into these stock cars and cinch those belts do after a fairly long career. But nothing out of the ordinary. Our staff hadn’t been treating him any differently from another driver or athlete. Yeah, don’t really have answers right now because it is so early on. I do know that he’s working super hard to get through this; he’s got a great team of specialists that are looking into this and looking after him.

“He’s undergone several rounds of testing to pinpoint exactly what it is. So the good news is it’s absolutely nothing concussion-related, anything like that, that should have a long-term effect. We’re supporting him as he goes down the right path and sees the right people to get himself better. That’s certainly our first priority, the health and safety of Alex Bowman, not only in one of our race cars but his personal health as a whole. We’ll support him however long this takes, and that seat will be ready for him when he’s ready to get back in that car.”