NASCAR Nadeau is antsy waiting for crash injuries to clear

This weekend will be his first time attending a Cup race since last October.
By DAMIAN DOTTORE
THE ORANGE COUNTY REGISTER
Patience is not one of Jerry Nadeau's virtues. And that's becoming a problem.
Every Sunday it's the same routine -- sink into the sofa in front of the TV and tune in to the Nextel Cup race. It can't get much worse than this for Nadeau. He's a race-car driver, not a channel-surfing couch potato.
Not too long ago, he was out there rubbing fenders with those guys.
And, oh, how he misses that part of his life. Nadeau, 33, worked toward being a professional race car driver since about the time he learned how to print his name, but now, as much as he hates to say it, that part of his life might be over.
Replay
During practice at Richmond (Va.) International Raceway one year ago, Nadeau's Pontiac spun and slammed driver's-side-first into the concrete retaining wall between Turns 1 and 2.
Even though he was wearing a HANS device, the violent collision left Nadeau with a life-threatening head injury and a partially collapsed left lung. When the track's safety crew arrived at the scene, Nadeau wasn't breathing.
It has been said that time can heal all wounds. Nadeau is seriously beginning to wonder about that.
Twelve months have passed, and the left side of his body, including his face and chest, feels "like it has fallen asleep," he said last month. And he has to deal with that every minute of every day.
Recently, Nadeau said, he sat down with his doctors and asked them to be as frank as possible. He wanted to know "if this was as good as it was going to get." Lately, he hasn't been seeing the type of progress he expected.
His doctors told him it is going to take more time. His brain injury will take two years, at least, to heal.
"I definitely didn't think I would be this way after all of this time," said Nadeau, who didn't regain full consciousness until 20 days after the crash.
"When you are in the hospital, you are on all of these drugs, and you feel great, but once you get out in real life, you begin to realize that you have a lot more work to do. It has been a frustrating year, for sure."
Right now, Nadeau said, he is "about 75 percent there."
"And it is a long, hard 25 percent that I have left," Nadeau said. "The thing about a brain injury is you can't see the problem. It is all hidden. Obviously, I can feel it. I can sense it."
Nadeau, who lives in Davidson, N.C., said it will be at least five months to a year before he will be ready to get back into a car again. He doesn't want to rush into anything. He said he doesn't need the money.
Nadeau, married and with a 15-month-old daughter, took out a good insurance policy before he started driving Cup cars, so all he has to worry about is "sitting back and healing." MB2 Motorsports has hired Joe Nemechek to drive Nadeau's car this season.
"I want to be out there only when I am sure that I will not put any other drivers in jeopardy," Nadeau said.
"And right now, I am not sure when or if that will ever happen."
Did testing
Last December, Nadeau tested one of MB2's cars at Concord (N.C.) Motorsports Park.
At first he said he was "quite scared and nervous," wondering what would happen to his head if he smacked the wall again.
Nadeau said he hasn't lost his feel for driving a race car, though.
On that day at Concord, he could tell when the car was loose or tight, and he even suggested a few suspension settings to help take care of problems. His lap times, he said, were within a half second of what's considered a good time there.
But here's what really made it a white-knuckle ride: He said he couldn't feel the brake pedal. Nadeau is a left-foot braker, and his brain injury still makes his left side feel numb and tingly.
This weekend, Nadeau is going to get up off his couch and head to Richmond to lead a cheering section for Nemechek. It will be the first time he has been to a Cup race since Oct. 5, when he attended the Banquet 400 in Kansas City, Kan. He said it's "too painful to be stuck in the pits," watching all of his buddies race.