He drove 153 mph — blind. Now, this Columbus man wants your help to break world record
He can’t see, but he drove a car he designed and helped build faster than 150 mph.
That’s three-fourths of a football field in 1 second.
On Feb. 23 at the Spaceport in New Mexico, Columbus resident Dan Parker, 49, set the American speed record for a blind person at 153 mph over 1½ miles — and he kept the car within 5 feet of the center line the whole way despite a 22-mph side wind.
“I’ve been blessed,” he told the Ledger-Enquirer, “because there’s no way I could have done this without the support and help of sponsors and donations.”
Parker’s story and his record will be featured in “Jay Leno’s Garage” on CNBC May 27 at 10 p.m. EDT.
Meanwhile, he and his Tragedy to Triumph Racing team are trying to raise money to break the world record of 200 mph.
Racing fever
Parker grew up learning from his father, Jimmy, how to design and build racing machines. When he finished second as an 8-year-old on a minibike against motorcycles at Phenix City Drag Strip, he caught a serious case of racing fever.
He grew his skills under the hood and behind the steering wheel. Pros throughout the racing industry sought his machinist expertise, and he won the 2005 American Drag Racing League Pro Nitrous world championship.
Then, on March 31, 2012, at Alabama International Dragway in Steele, Parker tested a new 864-cubic-inch motor in a pro modified car. At 175 mph, he crashed into a wall. The car tumbled and broke in half.
He not only lost his eyesight in the wreck but also his will to live.
On the verge of suicide, Parker said, he woke up in the middle of the night with a vision in his mind: “I was going to build a motorcycle and become the first blind man to race Bonneville.”
He did it the following year, driving a three-wheeler 55.331 mph at the Bonneville Salt Flats in Utah.
“That motorcycle literally saved my life,” he said, “because it gave me a purpose.”
So has Jennifer Stegall.
She was his girlfriend then and now is his fiancée. He proposed to her on “The Steve Harvey Show” last year. Their wedding was scheduled for last month but was postponed due to the coronavirus pandemic.
Stegall, a fingerprint technician for the Georgia Inspector General’s Office, explained why supports Parker’s dangerous pursuit.
“The fear has always been there, and it always is, but you don’t let it overcome you,” she said. “I’m thankful that he has the drive to pursue his passion and his love for racing. I prefer that he has something that keeps him driven and keeps him busy, as opposed to staying in the house and just feeling depressed all the time.”
Parker put it this way: “If you can turn your passion into a purpose, that helps tremendously to get through the low points in life.”
He graduated from the nine-month program at the Louisiana Center for Blind on March 31, 2015, three years to the date after the wreck. The adaptive skills he learned enabled him to work as a teacher’s aide in the Jordan Vocational High School machine shop for two years until headaches from the traumatic brain injury he suffered in the crash proved too much to continue.
“I’ve learned I have more patience than I thought I did,” he said with a laugh. “I tell everybody, if you don’t have patience, I don’t recommend going blind, because it’s going to try every one of them that you’ve got.”
The car
After notching the motorcycle record, Parker moved from Seale, Alabama, back to Columbus, where he had attended Fort Middle School and Shaw High School. And he aimed for the car record.
“Racers, we don’t know when to quit,” he said. “There’s always a challenge.”
Parker calls the 20-by-30-foot shop in his back yard “a 12-pack shoved into a six-pack box. … My neighbors have no idea what’s behind this house, what goes on back here and the story side of it.”
In 2½ years, with help from about two dozen folks, he transformed a 2008 C6 Corvette, salvaged from an Oklahoma City flood and missing the motor and the interior, into a racing machine fast enough and safe enough to vie for the record.
Modifications to accommodate his disability include having an extra steering wheel so the passenger can take control if needed.
“Everything the driver’s side has is mimicked on the passenger’s side,” he said.
The car also has an electronic guidance system, designed and built by Patrick Johnson of Boeing Phantom Works in Washington, D.C.
The guidance system audibly signals the driver if the car veers off the center line. It shuts off the engine if the car goes wayward by 20 feet or more.
Other safety features in the car include a parachute, double the amount of fire suppression, a full roll cage and specially designed seats.
Fulton Competition Race Engines of Spartanburg, South Carolina, provided the 427-cubic-inch motor, producing 725 horse power to the crank and 570 to the tires.
Parker estimated more than $100,000 has been put into the car alone. Combined with the guidance system, the racing machine is worth about $250,000, he said.
A producer from the “Jay Leno’s Garage” contacted Parker last fall and set up the filming of his record drive in February.
“Once I got a commitment from them,” he said, “that allowed me to go to marketing partners and sell advertising space.”
Record run
When his team arrived at the Spaceport, Parker noted, “This car had never been a quarter mile under its own power.”
The lack of practice was clear the day before the record run.
“I was zigzagging real bad,” he said. “The guidance system just wasn’t doing what it was supposed to do.”
They turned off the system, and Parker relied on verbal commands from his passenger Steve Strupp, owner of East Coast Timing Association, a sanctioning body for land speed events.
Parker’s top speed that run was 120 mph.
“I was happy,” he said, “but I knew I had so much more.”
During a team meeting, the crew agreed to not return to their hotel until they gave it their best shot.
Parker slept in the truck for three hours while his crew reprogrammed the guidance system. Around midnight, they tested it on the runway with rental cars escorting him. At 2:30 a.m., he went 116 mph without assistance.
“I was outrunning the rental cars so bad,” he recalled, “we said I can’t go no faster.”
The next day, Parker told Strupp, “Don’t touch that steering wheel unless you’re fearful for your life. … Believe in me.”
He replied, “You’ve got it, brother.”
Parker appreciates the trust Strupp put in him.
“From the time we started until I went through the finish line,” Parker said, “he didn’t say nothing, he didn’t do nothing.”
After crossing the finish line, Parker radioed engineer Patrick Johnson in the command station, “How fast did I go?”
Johnson told him 152 mph, but the traps measured the top speed at 153.8 mph.
“I just went crazy,” Parker said. “I was so happy inside the car, to be back racing. … Spending every waking hour focused on that car, trying to raise the money or coordinate parts, whatever it takes. I raced wide open. So for all that to come together at one moment, to know what you did was successful, was overwhelming.”
Jennifer soaked up the scene from the chase truck.
“I was very grateful,” she said. “I was very happy — crying. It was very emotional. I was extremely happy for him.”
As was Leno.
When they met at the finish line, Parker confirmed the guy congratulating him really was Leno by feeling his famous chin.
“I hope they don’t take that out (of the footage),” Stegall said.
Although four decades of racing helped prepare Parker, driving that fast without being able to see is a different kind of skill.
“As a sensation, it is weird,” he said. “… With the exhaust designed to be quiet so I can hear my guidance system and molded ear buds hooked to the guidance system and concentrating so much, nothing outside gives me a clue how fast I am going. I think once I get over 180 mph, it will change.”
After all, Parker emphasized, “I am not a blind man trying to race; I am a racer that went blind.”
Next step
Parker now is preparing to go after the blind driving world record of 200.9 mph, set by Mike Newman of England in 2014.
“He had a follow car through two-way radio tell him right, left, etc.,” Parker said. “A friend of mine in Australia, he’s been 168 on a motorcycle. Same thing, a follow motorcycle. But to do it independently, with no human assistance, I’m still to date the only person that ever done it.”
Parker’s team is trying to raise around $50,000 to go for the world record. He wants to practice at the Aeroplex in Blytheville, Arkansas, this summer, then make the world-record attempt back at the Spaceport in New Mexico or at the Space Shuttle Landing Facility in Florida.
“We’ve got the car,” he said. “There’s not even a question.”
The car has the horsepower and aerodynamics to go faster than 250 mph, Parker said, and a maximum safe speed of about 215 mph. So his improvement must come from more practice driving, and that will require more money.
“We just need more passes,” he said.
Along the way, Parker hopes to inspire folks to overcome their hardships.
“This car’s got a message that’s far greater than me,” he said. “… Even though I’m blind, I’m still doing what I’ve always loved.”
Parker added, “I never once will tell somebody it’s been easy, but it’s doable. ... You’ve got to try to stay positive, surround yourself with people that support you and believe in you. Anything is possible.”
HOW TO HELP
Despite being blind, Dan Parker makes ink pens on a lathe by using a digital caliper with an attached talk box that allows him to hear the measurements.
To help him raise money to pursue the world record for fastest blind driver, you can buy one of his custom pens on his website: TheBlindMachinist.com.
Engraved on the pen box is his motto: “You can make excuses, or you can make it happen.”
This story was originally published May 24, 2020 at 7:00 AM with the headline "He drove 153 mph — blind. Now, this Columbus man wants your help to break world record."
