NASCAR
TSJ101Sports Exclusive Interview With Robby Lyons
NASCAR Gander Outdoor Truck Series driver Robby Lyons has been racing since age 5. After many bone and head injuries sustained during his time racing motocross, Robby made the transition to stock cars. At the age of 23, Robby got into legend car racing and quickly began to move through the racing ranks. In only a few years, he now finds himself racing part-time in the NASCAR Truck Series.
Walk Us Through The First Times You Felt Symptoms Related To Your Concussions
“I didn’t really take the head injury thing to seriously for majority of my life up until the last few years,” Lyons said. He also mentioned how he’s counted roughly 18 concussions over his time racing bikes. “I knew that I had concussions and there was one time that lead to me quitting motocross. When a neurologist told me that my brain scans showed that if I hit my head hard enough again I might have permanent brain damage, I realized I should take it a little more seriously.”
“After I stopped racing bikes, I didn’t have any major impacts or anything until I started racing in the Truck Series. Actually going back to a Super Late Model race in August of 2017, I definitely got a concussion in that race. A guy I was holding up for a while got impatient and decided to dive bomb me, which spun me around to get hit by another car. Ever since then, I was feeling fatigued and having problems sleeping. I felt like it was just my personality because I’m an introvert as it is, but I noticed everything was stressing me out more than usual. Soon it kind of became evident that it wasn’t just stress.”
“Toward the end of the year, I ended up hearing Dale Jr’s story about his concussions. When listening to his book it was very eye-opening to say the least. I felt like I could have written his book. Long story short, I ended up getting in touch with Dr. Mickey Collins in Pittsburgh. That really set a chain of events in place that totally turned my life around 180 degrees. It was the best thing that could’ve happened for me.”
What Kind Of Tests Did You Go Through To Test Your Brain And Ability?
“The first thing that they have you do is something all drivers have to do, the imPACT Test. It’s basically testing eye coordination, memory, and reaction times. I’d taken a baseline test, and when I got to Pittsburgh I took the same test again. After I explained to him what my symptoms were and everything I’d been dealing with, he told me he had some good news and bad news. The bad news is I was certainly suffering from a certain type of concussion. To explain, he kind of drew out something on a piece of paper that looked like a triangle. He explained that there are 3 types of concussions with different symptoms. Basically, if you have one that goes untreated, you’re going to end up with symptoms from each of them. They’re all connected in one way or another, which makes them hard to diagnose.”
“So we put in a long-term plan. I say long-term plan, but it was around 4 months or so. I would go up there every 3 weeks and they would basically put you in every situation you would probably try to avoid. Super high-stress situations, and super physically exerting situations which they call exertion therapy. They’d make you run on a treadmill or throw a medicine ball back and forth while doing visual exercises at the same time. Basically overloading your brain until it got to a point your symptoms would show up. These all expanded your tolerance of a situation and retrained your brain on how to handle it. It was a challenge to say the least.”
Listen In For Much More From Robby Lyons!
During the interview, Robby Lyons also discusses how hard it was for him not to race in Texas. He then explains how he feels about NASCAR’s current concussion protocol. To end, he will discuss his upcoming conversation with Dale Earnhardt Jr. and express his feelings toward getting his story out along with pledging his brain to science.
To hear all of that and much more in detail, please listen to the recorded interview with Robby. The full interview is here. A special thanks goes out to Robby Lyons for allowing us to explore his story.
Follow the writer: twitter.com/noah_lewis1
