Blind Columbus man sets Guinness World Record at Spaceport America

Dan Parker of Columbus has set a Guinness World Record.

On a runway Thursday at Spaceport America in Truth or Consequences, New Mexico, Parker drove the car he designed and helped build 211.043 mph. That broke the previous record of 200.51 mph for the category called “Fastest Speed for a Car Driven Blindfolded,” set by Mike Newman of Britain at Elvington Airfield in Yorkshire on Aug. 13, 2014.

Parker, however, didn’t need a blindfold. He is blind.

Guinness World Records adjudicator Michael Emrick was on the scene, streamed on Facebook by the National Federation of the Blind, and verified Parker’s achievement.

“You are officially amazing,” Emrick told him.

After thanking his crew and supporters, Parker told the crowd, “This has been a long battle. I’ve been working on this car for 4 1/2 years, chasing this dream, chasing this record, and finally it came together today.”

Bad weather canceled a couple testing days, he said, and he woke up at 1:30 a.m. to design a part to fix a problem with the car, but Parker and his team persevered.

“I’m just tickled to death,” he said.

Then NFB secretary Norma Crosby explained the significance of the momentous moment.

“Lots of blind kids wake up every morning not knowing quite where they belong in the world and not knowing if it’s OK for them to have dreams,” she told the crowd. “Dan Parker proved today that not only is it OK to have dreams, but blind people can make dreams come true.”

How Dan Parker became blind

Parker grew up learning from his father, Jimmy, how to design and build racing machines. When he finished second as an 8-year-old on a minibike against motorcycles at Phenix City Drag Strip, he caught a serious case of racing fever.

He grew his skills under the hood and behind the steering wheel. Pros throughout the racing industry sought his machinist expertise, and he won the 2005 American Drag Racing League Pro Nitrous world championship.

Then, on March 31, 2012, at Alabama International Dragway in Steele, Parker tested a new 864-cubic-inch motor in a pro modified car. At 175 mph, he crashed into a wall. The car tumbled and broke in half.

He not only lost his eyesight in the wreck but also his will to live.

On the verge of suicide, Parker woke up in the middle of the night with a vision in his mind: “I was going to build a motorcycle and become the first blind man to race Bonneville,” he told the Ledger-Enquirer in a 2020 interview.

And he did it the following year, driving a three-wheeler 55.331 mph at the Bonneville Salt Flats in Utah.

“That motorcycle literally saved my life,” he said, “because it gave me a purpose.”

Parker graduated from the nine-month program at the Louisiana Center for Blind on March 31, 2015, three years to the date after the wreck. Now, March 31 has a third meaning in his life — the date he set a world record.

The adaptive skills he learned in Louisiana enabled him to work as a teacher’s aide in the Jordan Vocational High School machine shop in Columbus for two years until headaches from the traumatic brain injury he suffered in the crash proved too much to continue.

Since then, Parker has focused his time on chasing his dream of becoming the world’s fastest blind driver. He raises money for his Tragedy to Triumph Racing project by selling writing pens he makes in his shop, dubbed the Blind Machinist.