107 Pursuit

Long-time F1 driver Fernando Alonso forgot twenty years of his life in 2015. During pre-season testing in 2015 at the famous Barcelona track in Spain.

Alonso hit a wall at 93mph during testing and was reported unconscious and was taken to the hospital. Doctors reported he believed he was a kart racer rather than a two-time champion. He believed he was thirteen years old again.

He had forgotten everything from his Formula 1 career to Real Madrid’s wins in the Champions League over the year. This is very odd considering he is an active fan.

However, a week later, his memory was restored and although the memory loss was typical of a concussion, how someone could forget a whole twenty years and go back to normal is strange.

His doctors, specifically Dr. Rafael Blesa, mentioned there was no lasting damage and that the concussion did not lead to any abnormalities.

The science behind this condition is that the brain’s neural pathways are affected which blocks it’s abilities to find memory. And for a short period of time, these brain circuits fail to revert to normal and can take long periods of time to return. Fortunately, in Alonso’s case, he received his memory back shortly.

While this post was a short one, I hope it offered some interesting details regarding Fernando Alonso’s life before his retirement and comeback to F1 after that! Next week’s post will go more in depth about a certain topic so stay tuned!