Red Bull Racing team officials announced that his NASCAR driver Brian Vickers will miss Sunday's Autism Speaks 400 at Dover International Speedway because of a sudden medical condition diagnosed this week and Casey Mears will take Vickers' place in the No. 83 Toyota.
Vickers, who qualified for the Chase last season, was suddenly hospitalized for an undisclosed condition and was undergoing tests and further evaluation of his health.
In a statement to the press by RedBull team, Vickers announces:
"It is unfortunate that I will not be able to participate in the Dover race. Casey is a good friend of mine, and I know he will do his best for the No. 83 team this weekend."
Vickers' absence will break his streak of 87 consecutive Cup starts, dating to 2007, his first year in the Red Bull car. Missing the race also will deal a serious blow to Vickers' chances of making the Chase this season.
Vickers is 20th in the standings through 11 races, 464 points behind series leader Kevin Harvick and 160 points behind 12th-place Dale Earnhardt Jr. The top 12 drivers after 26 races qualify for the Chase.
Jay Frye, vice president and general manager of Red Bull Racing, said he believed Vickers was on an "intense type dosage" of medication, and wasn't sure when the driver would be released from the hospital and doctors nixed the idea of the driver turning one lap Sunday in an attempt to keep his Chase hopes alive.:
"Our main concern right now is with Brian and his health and recovery. All things are looking good at the moment. This is just a minor setback... At this point, we're not even sure when he's going to get out of the hospital, and we had to prepare for the weekend," Frye said. "His health is our No. 1 concern right now. ... This is something that is going to affect our chances of making the Chase. But he's a long-term player with Red Bull Racing, we're a long-term player in the sport, and our main concern is his health. If this affects the Chase, it's nothing we anticipated to happen, wanted to happen, but we've got to do what we've got to do... The rules are the rules. They've been the rules for a long time. We understand them. If this affects our Chase chances, which obviously it will, we'll just reset our goals for the rest of the season."
Frye added that he wasn't sure why the clots -- one of which was near Vickers' lungs -- had formed, but he didn't rule out racing as a contributing factor. Clots in veins often occur when blood flow becomes stagnant, and can be caused by something as mundane as sitting for long periods of time, which drivers certainly do in the race car. Carbon monoxide exposure can also play a role in clots that develop in the lungs.
"Brian is a very fit young man. He takes his physical conditioning very seriously," Frye said. "They don't know right now why this happened or what caused this to happen. ... Some of the contributing factors are things we do every week, and we do it a lot. So is that a reason? I don't know. I'm not a doctor. But I'm sure it all adds up somewhere in there."
