Not that Atwal doesn't have game. Best known for becoming, in 2004, the first Indian to earn full playing privileges on the PGA Tour, the globetrotting Atwal has ridden a mint putting stroke from Royal Calcutta Golf Club, where he picked up golf at 14; to suburban New York City, where as a high-school transplant on Long Island he cut his teeth at Bethpage Black; to success on just about every major golf tour. In 2005, his standout season, Atwal led the PGA Tour in putting and made the cut in all but one of his 17 starts, including a playoff appearance at the BellSouth Classic. A year later, the birdies had dried up, and by 2007 Atwal was back on the Nationwide Tour, fighting for a return ticket to the good life.
When his March 10 practice session with Woods ended, Atwal slid into his silver BMW M6 coupe, fastened his seat belt and followed the familiar five-mile route to the home he shared with his 2-year-old son Krishen and his wife, Sona, who was then pregnant with their second son, Shivo. As Atwal turned onto County Route 535, a flat, two-lane stretch of roadway lined by gated communities and farmland — and, police say, a popular stretch for street racing — he sped southbound on a straightaway; police later said Atwal was driving at least 94 mph when he spun out. Soon after a white Mercedes CLS was quickly gaining on him.
Atwal says he was going closer to 85 mph, but either way, witnesses told police, it didn't appear the two cars were out for a leisurely drive. "The Mercedes was trying to catch up with the BMW," said Elizabeth Schneider, who was traveling southbound on 535 behind the two cars. "And then it proceeded, I guess, into a race. Well, I know into a race, because [after] they passed a PT Cruiser on the right...they started accelerating with their speed and they took off. It was...it was on after that."
The driver of the other car was a fellow Isleworth member named John Noah Park, 49, a Korean-born video company executive. Atwal says he never met him.
Park was on his way to meet his family for dinner in nearby Lake Buena Vista. He, too, had children. He, too, drove a high-performance car. He, too, was speeding — up to 100 mph, the police later estimated. As he neared Atwal's car, Park swung his vehicle into the right lane and pulled nearly even with Atwal as they hit a bend in the road. At that moment, approximately 5:30 p.m., Atwal glanced into his rearview mirror and witnessed the beginning of a horrifying scene that would leave Park pinned under his windshield and Atwal in a prolonged state of sorrow, frustration and wrenching uncertainty.
And then what happened after the crash? Did you go up to the car or...
Yeah. First, you know, I got out of my car...
Right.
...thinking, you know, to see if my car was okay. And then I saw another guy who was — who was coming on the other side of the road.
Okay.
And he asked me, "Are you okay?" I said, "Yeah. I'm fine, you know."
Okay.
So then I walked across and saw, you know, that there were people standing here and that, you know, they were — I saw the car, and I was like, "Oh, my, God," you know. I didn't know what to, you know, do — or anything.
What do you do? What can you do? You wait for the police, tell them what happened — a freak accident, a horrible tragedy. Then you go home and hug your wife and child and try to get some rest just hours after death crept so close you could smell its fetid breath.
"When my car was spinning through the median and through oncoming traffic, I think there were two cars coming the other way that missed me," Atwal recalls today, seated in a dimly lit lounge at Isleworth. "When you think about it, if you get hit or the car rolls over on the median, you're done."
"I guess I was lucky," he says.
Park was not.
){kind=link}