Fri, 18 Oct 2002, 10:27 AM In The Overall Realm Of Life…

By Bob Frey Photo copyright 2002 Robert Grice & Auto Imagery, Inc.

Toby Torres

I have been very blessed in my life. I have a wife who loves me and allows me to make a living doing something that I thoroughly enjoy. I have three grown daughters and two wonderful grandsons who I get to spoil rotten (the grandsons, not the daughters!). With that as a background, I always tried to teach my daughters that we should always count our blessings instead of complaining about all of the little irritations that seem to come our way. As I would often say to them, "In the overall realm of life, the things we complain about are really very small compared to the troubles that some people face." After thirty-some years of preaching that to them, I think they’re beginning to see what I mean.

Toby Torres is forty-two years old and he’s been racing since he was sixteen, and he ’s been racing with two artificial legs since he was thirty-four. Toby was injured in a job related accident eight years ago and the man who now drives a very competitive Super Stock Eliminator car once wondered if he would ever walk again. At the time of the accident, Toby was leading the points at his local drag strip, and, ironically, even though he missed the last three races, he would hold on to that lead and win the championship. But now, after that tragic day in 1994, for a man who had raced for most of his adult life, in the overall realm of things, racing didn’t seem so important.

R.J. Torres

Toby lives in El Paso, Texas, with his wife, Judy, and two sons, R.J. and Zach. "I think R.J. was born with racing in his blood," Toby said about his oldest son who competes in the Super Stock Eliminator category in SS/GA, "while Zach is into baseball big time. In fact Judy is with Zach today at one of his high school games while R.J. is here racing with me," he told me during our interview at the recent Division 4 race in Noble, Oklahoma. Toby competes in Division 7 and quickly points out that the Pomona race track is closer to his El Paso home than either Dallas or Houston, which happen to be in his home state of Texas. "We have a long way to go to some of the races, but we love it so we pack up and hit the road." Toby races a 1988 Mustang in the SS/CM class and says that he has always loved Fords. "My first car was a ’69 Mustang with a 428 that I raced in C/SA," he said. "My dad bought the car for me on my mom’s birthday and I ran it from 1978 ‘til about ’85." Kind of makes you wonder what mom got for her birthday, doesn’t it? The current car has a 338 cubic inch engine that was prepared by Marvin Shaw, and it features a Pro Trans three speed transmission, Mark Williams rear end and lots of other good parts. "It’s a good car to drive and it’s pretty consistent," Toby added. So consistent that Toby was able to beat Delmer Wood, the former World Champion, and win the Dallas divisional race earlier this year, a race that has helped propel him to third place in the Division 7 Super Stock points standings.

Life changed dramatically for Toby back in 1994. He was unloading a dump truck that was filled with hardened asphalt when the load shifted and came pouring down on top of him. "The whole load, about 3,000 pounds, came down on my legs and it just took me right down with it," Toby said. "And since I was the only one in the quarry at the time, I was trapped under it for about 90 minutes." When someone finally came and found him, they extricated him and airlifted him to the hospital where they discovered that both of his legs had been crushed and he had lost a tremendous amount of blood. "I was told later, that on the day of the accident, over 200 family members and friends came to the hospital to see me. The hospital let them come by one at a time, but I was so severely injured and my face was so swollen that some of them didn’t believe it was me." When he woke up in the hospital five days later, they told Toby that he had been given seventy-seven units of blood in an effort just to keep him alive. "Both legs had been severely damaged, one was broken between the ankle and the calf while the other one had all of the skin ripped off of it," Toby said. "But the doctor told me that he thought he could save them so we started a series of operations that went on for the next ten days."

After weeks of almost constant operations, the doctor returned and asked Toby to make one of the toughest decisions a person could possibly have to make; did he want to continue with another series of operations, which could take more than a year, or did he want to have his legs amputated below the knee. Before making the decision, Toby said that he spoke with a fellow drag racer, Chuck Bella, who told him about a man who had inspired him and that he was amazed when he found out that the man was a double amputee. Toby also said that the day before the operation he got a phone call from Darrell Gwynn who offered him encouragement and told him to have faith. "Darrell reminded me that ‘tough people don’t go away, but tough times do,’ " Toby said. Toby opted for the operation and both of his legs were amputated below the knee. "I was lucky, in a way," he said, "since they amputated below the knee it made the recovery and the rehabilitation process of little easier." Easier is not exactly the word that I would use when you’re talking about having to learn to walk all over again.

Toby celebrates Division 4 win.

The chronology of an incident like this is something that the patient always remembers. "The accident happened a day after my 34^th birthday, I had the operation six weeks later, went back for some follow-up surgery three weeks after that, got my prosthetics in February and actually walked out of the hospital the day that they put my new legs on." While "walked" may be a bit of an exaggeration, Toby did manage, with a little help, to get to the car and back to his family with his new look and his new attitude. "I was determined that I was going to race again and that’s one of the things that kept me going through all of this." As you might imagine, a recovery period like that takes a considerable amount of time and Toby was out of racing for about 5 years. Then, on the 4^th of July in 1996, his dad took him for a ride and they bought their current car. "We left in the morning and came home at night with the car," he said with a smile. "Kind of an interesting 4^th of July in the Torres family, huh?" Indeed!

As he races today, Toby is quick to point out that he operates everything with his feet and legs on the car. "Some folks think that I have hand controls or something like that in the car, but I don’t. My feet and legs do all the work that they are supposed to do." Toby also admits to talking with Reggie Showers, another double amputee, who races in the Pro Stock bike class. "Reggie is a great example of what can be done even when you’ve had both legs amputated," he said. "Plus. He’s a great spokesman for PDI (Prosthetic Design Incorporated, Reggie’s main sponsor)." Well, after watching Toby race, I’d have to say that he is a great example, too. In fact, if you observed him working on the car and driving it, you’d never know about his past. "After a while, you just get on with your life and I’m fortunate do be able to do this," he said. Toby is quick to point out that the support from his family and friends make life a little easier. And, he also is the first one to say that after you’ve been through what he has, a foul start, a break out during eliminations or a close loss aren’t the end of the world. "With my current sponsorship from Pete and Jobie Alvarez at Watermill Express, with help from MSD ignition (Joe Pando and the gang), and Rick and Hector Guererro at Rick’s Hot Rod Shop, I’m one step closer to my dream of winning the divisional championship. It all comes down to Las Vegas, but whether I win or fall short, after what I’ve been through, I know I’ll always be winner." Like I always told my daughters, in the overall realm of life….

Toby did want to mention that, through this entire ordeal, he received a tremendous amount of support from the local bracket racing community in Texas and New Mexico. "With the leadership of the King family (NHRA Super Gas racers), from Alamogordo, New Mexico, the racers had benefit races for me that helped generate funds for my prosthetics, which cost over $40,000. The racers gave me strength and encouragement with their visits, phone calls and pep talks." Toby also wanted to thank Susan Finch, the principal at the O’Shea Keleher School where his children attended, for rallying the students to sell nachos after school and donate those funds toward the cost of the prosthetics. Plus, he wanted to thank the teachers at the school who took turns delivering dinner to the hospital so that his wife and children could stay there with him all the time. "I will be forever grateful to all of those people and to the people of El Paso who donated over 250 units of blood on my behalf. It was a true testament to the racers and the local community who came together as a family to support me every ‘step’ of the way. To them I am forever thankful and appreciative."

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