In 2012, Stuart Scoular lost his leg in a horrific Targa Rally crash. Driving a Subaru Impreza WRX, the New Zealander crashed into a bridge.
Tony Quinn and co-driver Naomi Tillett were first on the scene. Scoular credits Quinn with saving his life.
Scoular survived his injuries but underwent four hours of surgery after the crash to amputate his right leg below the knee. He also suffered a broken left leg, ankle, pelvis, and back.
“Circa 12 years ago, I was doing a lot of Targa Rally at the time and Tony Quinn was doing a lot of Targa Rally at the time,” Scoular told Greg Rust during the latest NextGen NZ Championship broadcast.
“I had a moment where ambition exceeded talent, shall we say. It was a moment where unfortunately I had a big accident, a life-changing incident that happened at that particular point in time.
“The first car onsite after that crash was Tony Quinn and Naomi Tillett. Frankly, they were there, and they saved my life.”
Quinn described the harrowing scene that he and co-driver Tillett encountered.
“Stuart was in front of us and he took off and then all of a sudden I saw this big, grey dust explosion – just a big dust cloud,” said Quinn.
“We came around the corner and he had run into a bridge, a culvert on the bridge. The car was smoking. We stopped, we jumped out, and then the navigator [Scoular’s brother Bret] was in a bad way so we dragged the navigator out of the car and got him beside the car.
“Because the car was on fire, I looked underneath the car to make sure that fire wasn’t coming from oil or the exhaust, and when I looked under the car I saw part of Stuart’s leg, the bottom part of his leg in a place that it shouldn’t have been because he was here and the leg was there.
“Naomi Tillett, my navigator, jumped into the car and tied a tourniquet around his leg. By this time, you’ve got to understand another car has come and we said ‘Go to the end of the stage and get the emergency guys to come out’.
“Luckily, we put the fire out and we got Stuart in a position where he was stable-ish. Luckily for Stuart and everybody, there was a doctor [John Torrance] that came. He then took over the scene.”
A little more than a decade later, the Scoular family has Quinn to thank again.
Stuart’s son Zack was the recipient of the Tony Quinn Foundation scholarship, funding the 17-year-old into a Toyota Formula Regional Oceania Championship season.
Zack was just four when his father suffered the life-changing crash.
The Scoular name mightn’t be all that familiar for New Zealanders. The businessman was living in Sydney at the time of the crash and has since moved to the United Arab Emirates.
Zack raced karts in Europe and Asia before stepping up to Formula 4.
Quinn said that his history with Stuart played no part in picking Zack to win the scholarship.
“To be quite fair, he was substantially better than the other guys in the shootout,” Quinn explained.
“He got the gig and it turned out to be the son of Stuart. It’s a really cute story, if you like.”
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