Undoubtedly, this story will be told a number of times throughout the upcoming NASCAR season. Last May, Brian Vickers was visiting troops at the Walter Reed Medical Center when he began experiencing chest pains and was rushed to the hospital. It turned out that Vickers had blood clots in his left hand, left leg and in both of his lungs. The former Nationwide Series champion would undergo heart surgery, and then began taking blood thinner medication- medication that put him out for the rest of 2010. Casey Mears, Reed Sorenson and Mattias Ekström would fill the seat of Vickers’ No. 83 Red Bull Toyota. We are now in the midst of 2011 Speedweeks, with the Budweiser Shootout behind us and the Gatorade Duels and the biggest event of the year, the Daytona 500, just up ahead. And with 2011 comes the return of Brian Vickers, an event many fans on Twitter have welcomed with positive tweets like “it’s so nice to see Brian back at the track.” But a recent article about NASCAR’s comeback kid by MAXIM Magazine makes Vickers look like anything but a heart warming story of a man defeating death to return to the sport he loves. Instead, Vickers comes off looking like, well, a jackass. Whether it’s true or not, that’s how he comes across. The article makes ten references to the former Chase contender’s drinking habit. This coming days removed from Nationwide Series driver Michael Annett being arrested for a DUI, after being found with a blood alcohol level four times the legal limit in North Carolina. Annett, who will not face a suspension from either NASCAR nor his team Rusty Wallace, Inc., profusely apologized for the incident and said he hoped to use the experience to become a better person. The mentions of alcohol in the Vickers article include: “… but stays here (in SoHo, where his New York penthouse is located) when he’s not boozing in the Bahamas…” “But because of the blood thinners, he could have none of the dangerous fun he’s known for among friends- from blackout drinking binges to daredevil action sports- for fear he’d bleed to death.” “…combined with hard drinking spells that fuel his relentless, connoisseur’s pursuit of pussy in all its forms.” “He gains velocity by consuming untold vodkas, lurches from club to bar to club, and staggers home with women in multiples. Whether he remembers anything the next morning is a crapshoot.” “One day he e-mails me, “You know it was a good night when you find a picture of you at a bar, with a dog… and you don’t know where it came from.” “I join him on one of those nights, in a bar on Houston Street. Vickers is drinking like an elite athlete- raining a succession of vodkas…” The unflattering portrayal of Vickers, however, doesn’t stop there. The writer of the article, Mike Guy, makes it a point to say “Though he may have been born in the heart of NASCAR country, hands on a steering wheel, he graduated at the top of his class, studies Ayn Rand books, pores over The Wall Street Journal, and is not above the occasional bout of meditation.” As if saying other people from North Carolina, where Vickers is from, couldn’t possibly fathom doing things like that, feeding into the “redneck” stereotype. Not only that, but Vickers also hurled an insult toward former teammate and fellow New York City resident Jeff Gordon. The two drove together at Hendrick Motorsports in the Sprint Cup Series for three seasons. “Vickers makes a phone call to Jeff Gordon, hectoring him for not coming out to get trashed. “Fuckin’ Gordon,” Vickers says. “He used to be a lot of fun.”” The 27 year old bachelor’s less lustrous attitude toward women- something that surprises no one with this generation’s crop of young, single male athletes. “The night is ending—or nearly. BV’s crew wanders thirstily into the Hiro Ballroom,” the article states. “To a female companion, Vickers wonders aloud who the hottest chick in the room is, and they agree on a willowy blonde looking bored on the dance floor with a banker type.“I’m going to go give her a ride,” Vickers says. “Hell, what do I have to lose?”
Whether or not this is an unfair portrayal of Vickers, it will be interesting how the NASCAR fans, media and the driver himself react to it. A similar article came out in Rolling Stone in 2008 (written, ironically enough, by the same person who wrote the Vickers profile) about Tony Stewart, where he talked about his parents worrying about him contracting an STD, and compared Kurt Busch to a “one of those kids in high school that talk all the time and never shut up.”
In reaction to the Rolling Stone piece, Stewart had this to say about how his personality came across to readers:
"Some of that was stretched a little further in talks that were more behind closed doors than the way it really is," Stewart explained. "It was casual joking conversations that ended up coming out that weren't necessarily the way it was (when) put on paper. When you give somebody that kind of access, you open yourself up for things like that to happen."
Maybe this is the same case with Brian Vickers.
You can read the entire Maxim article here.
Thanks to Maxim, SB Nation, Racing Reference, ESPN, USA Today and Scene Daily for the information and quotes used in this piece.
All views expressed are solely that of the writer.
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