THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Saturday, September 30, 1995 TAG: 9509300415
SECTION: SPORTS PAGE: C5 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY BOB ZELLER, STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: NORTH WILKESBORO, N.C. LENGTH: Medium: 74 lines
Hey, Ernie Irvan, ever hear of Ralph Brinkley?
Brinkley has been winning track championships in big, fast, V-8 modified cars since you were in high school.
Since 1973, Brinkley has won eight NASCAR modified championships and 63 feature races at Bowman-Gray Stadium in Winston-Salem. He's been flying his own plane for 15 years.
And he's only got one good eye. His right eye is glass.
``I can honestly say I didn't hit nobody I didn't think I was going to hit,'' Brinkley said this week in a phone interview. ``When I bump 'em, they know why I bump 'em.
``Now, I always do try to have a pretty good mirror.''
Brinkley, 55, of Lexington, N.C., lost his right eye to cancer when he was 9. ``Most of what I've done, I've done with one eye,'' he said. ``A lot of times I think the strength goes from one eye to another.''
Brinkley, in fact, thought he might have a ride in the Lowe's 150 here today at North Wilkesboro Speedway. It's the same NASCAR SuperTruck race in which Irvan will make his comeback - with only one eye - after a 13-month recovery from a crash at Michigan that nearly killed him.
``I was about to have a truck ride,'' Brinkley said. ``A friend of mine called me up and talked about it, but it ended up that nothing worked out. I would have liked to go in there with Ernie. Both of us together would have made some team.''
``A lot of people live perfectly normal, critical lives with one eye,'' said Dr. George S. Malouf, a leading ophthalmologist in Washington, D.C. ``On the other hand, (Irvan) is clearly at a disadvantage compared to the way he used to be.''
Irvan's problem eye is his left eye. He can see out of it, but the image is double. He plans to race today with an eye patch over his left eye.
Malouf said federal regulations prohibit people with one eye to be commercial pilots, or even commercial truck drivers. ``But the longer you live with it, the more you become accustomed to distance and depth,'' he said.
``The problem is depth perception,'' Malouf said. ``But anything beyond 20 feet is not significant. You don't really get a sense of stereopsis (three-dimensional vision) beyond 20 feet. And between 10 and 20 feet is not that major. But at less than 10 feet, stereopsis is very important, especially for things like threading a needle and lighting a candle.
``If you're driving at 200 miles per hour with cars all around you and the bumpers touch, that could be a problem.''
Brinkley, however, said he was quite comfortable driving a modified car on the high banks of the 1.5-mile Charlotte Motor Speedway. The only thing that deterred him, Brinkley said, was the fact that friends and acquaintances were convinced he couldn't do things because of his handicap.
``The only thing that held me up in racing was people saying you can't race if you have one eye,'' he said. ``You get to believing that junk. But I've won at Concord, won at Bowman-Gray, I've raced at Charlotte. I won one at North Wilkesboro, but they hoo-dooed me out of it.
``I follow any of 'em close. You can ask any of 'em. I can follow someone for 200 laps and stay 2 feet off their bumper. I can come from behind you on the highway and push you so easy you wouldn't know I touched you.
``Now if I take two pencils and stick them out in front of my eyes and try to line 'em up, I might be off a half inch. But as long as things are moving, I don't have no problem with that. Now, I do maybe try to rely on my hearing a little more than the other guys. I try to listen more for cars.''
``I got my own plane (a Piper Cherokee) and when I was taking my flight training (in 1981), some guy said, `Why are you doing this? You're not going to be able to fly.' I ended up passing all my tests, and he didn't. The only thing I had to do (extra) is I had to go get an FAA examiner, had to take him up and demonstrate my ability. Other people wouldn't have had to done that.''
As for Irvan, Brinkley said: ``I don't think he'll have a problem.'' by CNB