Race car driving is already a very dangerous sport, but one local driver has the odds stacked against him from birth.
Nothing seems to keep Leander's Chris Birmingham off the track -- not even a heart condition.
“I eat, sleep and breathe racing. I love to go fast everywhere I go. I don't plan on letting anything stop it," Birmingham said. "I was born with a heart defect. I haven't quite been right since I was born.”
Birmingham was born with only three chambers in his heart. So, he had open-heart surgery at eight months old and also again when he was eight years old. He thought the worst was behind him until November 2001 when his life changed at Seton Medical Center.
"Back in 2001, I went to work one morning and was sitting in a break room and I just blacked out," Birmingham said.
"That was probably the worst week of my life. He spent about six days in ICU after all of that. It was very nerve racking," Birmingham’s wife, Danielle, said.
Chris now has a pacemaker to keep his heart rate from dropping too low and he gets checkups once every three months.
"My pacemaker will only kick in if my heart decides it's going to slow down to 60-beats-per-minute," Chris said.
His heart began to flutter abnormally this past weekend at Thunder Hill Raceway in Kyle. Chris's yellow 1976 Chevy Nova was tapped from behind and he lost control as his right rear axel broke on the 17th lap of a 30-lap race.
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Heart help for race car driver
One Leander race car driver doesn't let his heart condition keep him from doing what he loves.
 
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Chris was back in a familiar place in the rear of an ambulance. That, however, won’t stop him from racing.
"I'm not going to quit racing. I won't quit racing. You know I've been through the toughest of tough. Anyone in my family can contest to that. I don't think there's anything that can get me down,” Chris said.
Chris won his first feature race at Kyle's Thunder Hill Raceway about a month ago. But win or lose, Birmingham continues to claim victory in the game of life whether it's dangerous or not.
