YouTube video (Talladega NASCAR 2023 | Amber Balcaen Racing) featuring driver Amber Balcaen describing her journey from Winnipeg to racing in the ARCA Menards Series, overcoming a severe 2020 dirt-midget crash (collapsed lungs, concussion; ~2 months recovery), and competing at Talladega where a debris-caused oil-pan/clutch failure ended a strong run (running third). The video includes race-day commentary and crowd/track announcements and emphasizes Balcaen's underdog mentality and resilience.
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My name is Amber Balkan. I'm from Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada. Now living in North Carolina, where I moved to pursue my dreams of becoming a NASCAR driver. I currently race in NASCAR's ARC Menard Series, which is a national series touring all the usa. Great series. We get to race dirt pavement, road course, oval course, super speedway, short tracks, intermediate tracks. So it's a really fun series and I'm really, really grateful to be a part of it.
I come from humble beginnings. You know, I'm a dirt track racer and to be in this industry of NASCAR where, you know, the wealth, the fame, everything that's in it, I'm a true underdog. I've had to grind and work to get here and have felt like I've been punched in the face 100 times and have had so much rejection and just so many challenges, so much struggle to just get to race, nevermind being on the race track. So I think that's kind of where the underdog mentality comes from. Just starting from the bottom and working your way.
So in 2020 was Covid and all the sponsorship I had lined up to race nascar, they all dropped, obviously because of the pandemic. And so that season I decided to go back to my roots of dirt track racing. And I raced what are called dirt midgets. These cars flip very easily and very viciously. And unfortunately, I experienced that and had the worst crash of my entire career. I flipped up in the air probably 20, 30ft viciously over and over and over. When I woke up, I was in an ambulance. I couldn't feel my legs, I couldn't feel my arms. I thought I was paralyzed at this point. Thankfully, a few minutes later, they injected me with adrenaline and my feeling of my legs and arms started to come back. But I did end up in the hospital for quite a few days. I had collapsed lungs, really bad concussion, and basically spent two weeks in bed afterwards. It took me two weeks to be able to lift my arms above my shoulders, to be able to be in daylight and walk for more than two or three minutes. And the whole recovery took around two months. And the day that it happened that night was the first time I've ever said in my career that I'm done racing. And I genuinely believe that it was it for me. And then the next day, after talking with the doctor, knowing that I could recover and I would be okay, then I started figuring out, you know, how I could get back in the car. So it took me two months to get back in the car, but I did it and basically My reasoning for that was I didn't want that to be the end of my career. I didn't want to go out that way. I want to go out on top. I had so many goals and dreams that I had not fulfilled yet. And, you know, my biggest dream was to be in a national NASCAR series, and that's what I'm getting to do this year. So if I had given up two years ago, I wouldn't be where I am now. And I'm truly living my dream. I wake up every single day so grateful that this is my life and this is what I get to do. But it took 10 years of really hard times to get here, and it took that crash and overcoming that mentally and physically to get here. And I truly believe after hitting rock bottom and going through the worst of the worst, that's when you skyrocket after that. And I think this is proof because I was. Went through a lot, and that crash was just the tip of the iceberg. And. But I didn't give up. And here we are. Now.
I want to go back to the fans. I mean, that is the greatest thing about coming to Talladega in Alabama. They know how to throw parties. This racetrack has always been a perfect example, but this is an awesome weekend, and I'm glad to see so many fans here this weekend. It's just an amazing atmosphere.
Tigers, start your engines.
The green flag is in the air. We're racing at Talladega.
It was contact between 69 and Scott Melton.
Yeah, I think what Sorrel is. Looks like the 15 had some sort of issue. She decides to dive to the bottom. That's why everybody gets all stacked up.
So all of the adjustments we made from yesterday's practice to today's race was perfect. The car was super fast. We were running third the entire race, and unfortunately, we must have ran over a little bit debris. It came up, cut the oil pan, and blew our clutch out. So unfortunately, we didn't get to finish something out of our control. My team put together a really fast car. We had a strategy going into the race for the start for me to let my teammate in in front of me. We executed that perfectly. Whereas single file, like, we, my team, myself, my teammates, we all executed perfectly, which was great. Unfortunately, this is just one of those things that are out of your control. There's a lot of variables in racing and a lot of things out of our control, and unfortunately, it's just one of those days. Yeah. So going into three and four, I felt the engine kind of Rev up a little bit and thought it was kind of strange, but didn't know if it was just the way the air was being manipulated. And then into three, felt a little blurp again. Or into one. And then coming out of two, I just lost all power. So my foot was to the floor, but the engine wasn't making the car go forward, so had to pull down and unfortunately, originally come in, the guys checked it out and it just. We weren't able to fix it to.
Get back out there.
Emotionally, I'm really disappointed. I'm really bummed because we were in a position to win the race. We were third. We were doing exactly what we were supposed to do. But this is racing. This is a sport. If it was something I did wrong, I would have been really pissed off and really mad at myself. But I know I did everything I could do in my control. So I have to leave with my head up, knowing that I did my job. But still unfortunate for my team, my sponsors, and myself that we didn't get to finish this race when we had.
A car that could win. The thing that I'm definitely most proud of is having to do this all on my own and raise all the funding. It's so unheard of in my sport. And everyone laughed in my face when I said, I'm going to be a NASCAR driver. Everyone I raced dirt against, they all laughed at me. They all made fun of me. They all rolled their eyes when I, you know, thought about this, and I didn't know how hard it was going to be. It is much more difficult than I thought, but I just really put my head down and just kept working at it and kept working at it. And I think the biggest thing for anyone wanting to pursue a big dream or anything that seems, you know, out of the ordinary is to not let the opinions of others dictate the decisions you make for yourself. If you want something bad enough and you're willing to work for it, then you can make it happen. And you don't need all the tools in the toolbox to build the life of your dreams. You just need to be willing to work really hard, be dedicated, be consistent, and be disciplined. And I think if you can stay that course for long enough, you're eventually going to get to where you want to be.
