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AIPROPX ReportYahoo Sports · 2h ago
Inside Bob Pierce's Stroke Recovery, Emotional Return Alongside Son Bobby
When Bob Pierce was life-flighted to the University of Nebraska Medical Center in Omaha following the serious stroke July 15, Angie Pierce knew life would change forever for her family and Bobby Pierce Racing.
"I told (Bobby) right then and there, 'Our lives are ... drastically going to change,' " Angie said. "Seeing the condition Bob was in, I thought, this is going to be life-altering."
Two days later, Angie received miraculous proof that her 74-year-old husband was still, unmistakably, Bob Pierce, the team's crew chief and former Hall of Fame driver. The revelation didn't come from a neurologist's report.
It came Friday night during the Silver Dollar Nationals at Shelby County Speedway, where Bobby returned to the track some 50 miles away in Harlan, Iowa, while Bob remained in the intensive care unit waiting for doctors to perform a second procedure the following Monday.
Bob, of course, refused to miss a single lap watching from his hospital bed, even with ICU staff interrupting him every 15 minutes to check his vitals, movement and neurological responses. Angie, meanwhile, tracked down an Amazon Fire Stick so they could stream FloRacing's Silver Dollar Nationals live coverage on the room's TV.
"The crazy thing about it is, I'm sitting in the hospital next to him, and Bobby's blowing his phone up," Angie said. "They're talking, like, literally every minute. ... Bob was like, 'Do this. Do this. Put this on that.' This was all two days into having a stroke - two days! - and you could see how tired he was. He had zero energy."
Then came the moment that erased the brunt of Angie's doubts, when Bobby needed more than simple setup advice. He needed a specific shock, but couldn't remember which one - or where it sat inside the trailer. Using FaceTime on his phone's camera, he showed several options.
" 'No, not that shock,' " Angie remembered Bob saying. " 'Look for the one that's on the counter, on the left, on the bottom.' Like, he knew. He was able to tell him."
When Bobby found it and began to make adjustments, Bob wasn't finished.
"He'd say, 'No, no, no. Turn it this way. Do this this way,' " she said.
Watching from beside his hospital bed, Angie realized the stroke hadn't touched Bob's mastermind, one cultivated through decades of building race cars, perfecting setups and raising a generational superstar in his son, Bobby. It was clear the essence of Bob remained.
"I'm just sitting there thinking, 'He didn't lose this,' " Angie said. "I'm like, 'Dang, you remember every single thing about the race car and the setups.' Then he's like, 'Last race we did this. This race we did that.' This guy is in ICU two days into having a stroke, and he's telling Bobby exactly what to do."
Just two weeks later, Bob returned for his first full race weekend alongside his son at Cedar Lake Speedway, helping guide Bobby to victory in Saturday's USA Nationals - their first triumph together since the stroke that threatened far more than a racing season.
"I could've gotten real emotional tonight if I wanted to," the elder Pierce said after Bobby's third USA Nationals victory in four years. "I was close to doing so. I wanted it for him, too. He needed another win."
Throughout his recovery, Bob has quietly battled the fear that he can no longer give Bobby everything he's always provided. Whether it's the energy, the sharpness to stay ahead of every adjustment or simply the confidence to make the right call, Bob has spent the last two weeks trying to prove he's still the same crew chief - and father.
"The biggest thing that bugs me about it is I can't go as hard as I want to go, stay on top of everything," the elder Pierce said. "I feel like I'm the problem of why we're not running good. I blame it on myself all the time. Just trying to stay focused and keep him focused."
That self-doubt has made Bob more mindful than ever, forcing him to constantly check himself throughout the day.
"I think twice as hard to make sure I don't do something wrong or forget to do something," he said. "If I do something, I make sure I do it right. I'm watching over myself a lot. I feel like I'm OK. I just feel like everything is in slow motion. That's the weird part."
Angie, meanwhile, has heard those concerns from Bob almost nightly over the last two weeks.
"Bob, we've talked at night over these last couple races where we've been just a little bit off," Angie said. "It's not his fault, but he takes the blame for that stuff. So he'll be like, 'Yeah, I'm just not as sharp. I'm just not as sharp yet.' And there might be a little bit of truth in that. He might be missing a little bit, but he's not missing much. He's still Bob."
A long but rewarding three days at Cedar Lake Speedway put Bob to the test: a full Thursday program, a 3-9 p.m. shift preparing the team's backup car during Friday's rainout following a lackluster 12th-place run Thursday in the primary race machine, and Saturday's 8.5-hour marathon that began with 5 p.m. hot laps and ended with USA Nationals celebrations shortly after 1:15 a.m.
The stroke's lingering effects were most noticeable in Bob's pace. He still used his electric bike around the pits, but only sparingly, never venturing too far from the team's trailer in case he needed a break. He walked more deliberately than before the stroke, his speech occasionally more mumbled, and left anything heavier than 10 pounds for others to carry under doctors' orders.
Even so, the workload he endured represented a remarkable change from where he'd been less than two w...
Bob PierceBobby'sUSA NationalsWhen Bob PierceUniversityNebraska Medical CenterOmahaAngie PierceBobby Pierce RacingBobbyAngieSeeing
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