McNish races again after Le Mans horror 01 | 07 | 2011
IT'S LESS THAN three weeks since Allan McNish, uninjured apart from a crazed shin, miraculously stepped out of his wrecked Audi at Le Mans after one of the most violent crashes in the race's history. Yet today the 41-year-old from Dumfries returns to racing as he prepares for this weekend's International Le Mans Championship at Imola in Italy.
Anyone who witnessed McNish's crash, either live, on TV or on YouTube, would be excused for questioning the Scot's sanity in wanting to return to 200mph racing.
But the double Le Mans winner and multiple American Le Mans Series champ — speaking at length about his recuperation for the first time — can't wait to return to action.
"Racing; it's what I do. Why would I not want to get back inside a car and go racing?" he explained today. "I'm fine. Well I'm feeling a little light-headed after a haircut, but that apart, I'm fine."
As McNish's Audi R18TDI disintegrated into a mangled wreck in the split-second after it hit the tyre wall at the Dunlop Curves at 140mph, 'feeling fine' wasn't what he was thinking as he sat strapped in his cabin.
"I can remember the car hitting the tyrewall backwards; I knew there was going to be an impact, but I had no idea it was going to be so violent," he continued. "A lot of things were flying about the cockpit so I had no visual image the car was rolling.
McNish survives 130mph horror smash: watch video
"I remember thinking, 'Crikey, this is lasting a long time,' because normally you've got one hit and then the car maybe does something, and then it stops. This just kept on going.
"To be honest it was the next morning after the crash when, I came down into the reception area of my hotel after having had a good night's sleep, that I realised how big the crash had been.
"There was a big news stand in the reception and the front page of every French newspaper had photographs of my crash in the front and back pages. That's when I realised how big the impact had been."
That McNish survived the horrific smash, let alone walked out of the car unaided after marshals had righted the wreck, is testament not only to the build quality of Audi, but also the safety measures introduced into motorsport, many of them at the insistence of Prof Sid Watkins who has a home in the Scottish Borders.
Liverpool-born Watkins, the professor of neurosurgery who founded the Brain & Spine Foundation in 1992 and was brought into F1 by Bernie Ecclestone in the late Seventies, had an early influence on McNish's career.
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Racing for Jackie Stewart's British F3 team at Brands Hatch in 1989, McNish, inching towards the title, crashed during qualifying and 'bumped' his head.
"I rolled the car and Jackie sent me to see Professor Sid," McNish explained. "I'd never heard of this 'Sid' before, but he immediately banned me from driving for six weeks.
"I thought 'who the hell are you? Ban me from driving and that's my British F3 Championship gone.' But that was it; no racing because of this 'stupid' doctor. So, having bought a plane ticket for Glasgow, I told my dad to pick me up at the airport.
"The plane duly landed in Edinburgh. I'd got on the wrong flight, because my head wasn't 100%. That's when I realised the 'doc' knew far more than I did about head injuries."
That experience, and acceptance of medical advice, contributed to McNish making his full recovery after Le Mans.
"After being checked at the circuit and scanned at the local hospital, the docs had me under surveillance till 1.30am," he continued. "The rest of the following week I was under strict instructions to do absolutely nothing; no emails, no phone calls. Nothing.
"I've had enough incidents in my life to know they are the guys who truly know what's going on and whether the driver is actually fit enough to jump back in the car to go racing. I'm certainly not going to question anything they say."
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Today though won't be the first time McNish has driven his race car since the crash. Just 10 days after the smash, the Scot was at Lausitzring in Germany for a day-and-a-half's test. Was he nervous?
"Nervous?" he smiled. "When you've had a knock, there's always a question mark over whether you're fully ready to get back into it, and whether you'll be as fast as you were before.
"Through the course of the test everything just fell back into a natural rhythm. Lap times and consistency were quickly back to where roughly they should be.
"I slept on it overnight, went back out the next day for a couple of long runs and felt ok. So now, we're ready to get back into the action at Imola."
McNish, who will partner his close friend and eight-times Le Mans winner Tom Kristensen, faces a stern test in Sunday's six-hour race.
"Traditionally the Audi has been strong over the long races, while the Peugeots seem to fair better over the shorter 'sprints', like Imola," the Scot admitted. "We need to raise our game a bit this weekend but, just like any other race, we're here to win."
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Jim McGill