Garrett Alberson and his family shared a new update on his recovery after he was struck by an object in the head during the North/South 100 at Florence Speedway on August 8th.

In a post to Facebook, Alberson and his family shared, “We were released to go home this last weekend, and did so happily! The doctors in Cincinnati were fantastic and got us through the critical point, then let us go to follow up at home.”

“Garrett is doing better. He’s active(ish) and mobile(iissshhh) but we have surgery scheduled Thursday, and we’ll see how things go from there,” they added.

They also thanked God and the racing community for helping them through the injury, “The Lord has continued to bless us through the racing community, the people close to us, and our fans. Thank you so so much to all of you who have so generously sent food, encouragement, funds to Venmo, the gofundme, PayPal. We have been blessed through you, it is a humbling thing to watch yall rally around us. Thank you.”

Alberson was injured with 40 laps left in the 100-lap North/South 100 feature. He was running in 7th and slowed in the top of turn 1 and eventually came to a stop in turn 2. He quickly unbuckled and exited the car. After he got out of the car, he dropped to his knees as he worked to get his helmet off. 

FloRacing’s Dustin Jarrett would report that “Garrett was hit with something out there on the race track: a rock, a mud clot, not real sure. It actually made a laceration above his eye, above one of his eyes. The rock, mud clot, whatever it was. And so they are going to transport him to a local hospital for further evaluation.”

After being evaluated at a local hospital, Alberson’s wife Dani shared that he suffered “a broken nose, a couple facial fractures and a laceration above his eye. The docs did a good taking care of him.”

It’s unclear exactly what struck him, but he and his team shared in a post to Facebook on Tuesday, August 11th, “Given the extent of damage to his face, we have to guess whatever came through the bars was much heavier. His shield did not shatter, it indented and smashed the whole helmet into his head.”

“We are blessed that Simpson Race Products made such a durable helmet, the doctors told us it likely saved his eyes, and his life,” the team added. “The Lucas Oil Late Model Dirt Series officials did a great job getting him taken care of on track, and have reviewed the helmet since.”

In addition to the post they shared the damage the object did to his helmet.

Alberson also informed StockCarReport, “What it was didn’t quite make it through the shield but impacted hard enough to essentially smash the shell/shield into my face/eye. So it was heavy whatever it was.”

In a post on Thursday, August 13th, the family shared more information about the extent of his injuries, “We’ve been back to the hospital in Cincinnati every day since Sunday for follow ups with the specialists. We were told these first five days were critical to ensure Garrett wouldn’t lose his eyesight long term, and his facial bones would heal correctly.”

In a post on Saturday, August 15th, the team relayed that he would require surgery and his recovery would take between six and eight weeks, “We’ve been officially told 6-8 weeks before we can return, and Garrett will likely have surgery this week. We don’t know what that means for the rest of the year, but we’ll be discussing with our team.”

The aforementioned GoFundMe is still active and has raised over $46,000 for Alberson’s recovery.

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