Bubba Wallace visits Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, takes home memories

Sitting in a centrifuge at the Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, Bubba Wallace navigated his way through the simulated flight. "How high do you have to be to do a successful flip?" he asked, surrounded by controls and overlooking a simulated grid in the air. "You want to start that about 15,000 (feet)," he was told. Wallace visited the Human Performance Wing of the Dayton, Ohio, base on Sept. 7 ahead of the race weekend at Indianapolis Motor Speedway as part of his partnership with the U.S. Air Force. MORE: Behind-the-scenes photos from Wallace's day [caption id="attachment_141242" align="alignleft" width="400"] A look at Bubba Wallace spending time in the centrifuge simulating a flight. (Jessica Ruffin | NASCAR Digital Media)[/caption] "The flight simulator was pretty tough," Wallace told NASCAR.com. "I was struggling a little bit. I crashed on trying to take off. Pulled it up too much and destroyed the plane. "So, I would have died – so I wouldn't be a good pilot," he added, lightheartedly. In addition to the centrifuge, Wallace also toured the Brain Stimulation Lab and the Strong Lab, partaking in different exercises and chatting with base personnel throughout the day. He tested his sweat levels and his reaction time – with a machine he likened to a "Whac-A-Mole"-type game at Dave & Busters -- and went through blind target practice with a laser gun in the Strong Lab. In the Brain Stimulation Lab, he learned about the newest technology that was being developed to stimulate memory, alertness and attention --- and even tried out the transcutaneous vagal nerve simulator for himself. "Have you had any surgeries on your neck or anything in your life?" he was asked, to which Wallace responded with his trademark humor. "Nope, am I going to need one after this?" he joked. [caption id="attachment_141243" align="alignright" width="300"] Bubba Wallace tries out a transcutaneous vagal nerve stimulator that, when used, makes its user more alert and attentive. (Jessica Ruffin | NASCAR Digital Media)[/caption] Wallace put the tool to his neck to begin the stimulation and was then instructed to step into something all-too-familiar for the No. 43 wheelman: a driving simulator. A computer outside the simulator measured his attention during the course. "We gotta get one of these before a race," he said, later noting the similarities between his job as a race car driver and some of the tasks he partook in that day. "There are some parallels there," he said. "Once you’re kind of in your realm, you kind of know what to do and I wasn’t in my realm there, so I’m kind of learning everything. So, it would be cool to spend a day with the pilots, go through that and then bring them to our world. Obviously, I can't fly the plane, they can’t drive the race car, but we could put them in our simulator and we could get their reaction." For Wallace, his regular visits to Air Force bases are important not only for his partnership, but also to expand his own knowledge of the group’s depth. "Any time we get to do an Air Force appearance, I'm always questioning, ‘What are we doing?’ … Obviously, I know it's going to be super exciting," he said. " … When you think of the military, you think of shooting guns, flying planes, blowing stuff up, right? Going across seas, fighting for our country, fighting for our freedom. "But you never think about the behind the scenes of people doing this stuff ... just different departments that you don't think about … They're doing studies and activities to see how we can make them more efficient people on the battlefield. We have a whole team of people doing that. It's super cool." The visit left Wallace with many learned lessons – and also a few memories to take back home to North Carolina. "Going through all three departments that we went through, seeing the nutrition side of it and all the technology that's coming out, monitoring your sweat levels, doing a bunch of peripheral vision stuff, trying to focus on multiple things at once -- it's super cool and my mind's racing," he said. "I can't wait to talk to people about this, what I did today."