Blanchard Sponsors #88 Gabby Chaves for 101st Indy 500
Blanchard is excited to announce our support of IndyCar driver Gabby Chaves, in the No. 88 Harding Racing car for the 101st running of the Indy 500. Chaves has been wearing Onefit™ Scleral Lenses since February of 2017, and reached out to Blanchard to express his gratitude for what the lenses have done to help continue his racing career. From there, a partnership was formed and the Onefit™ Scleral Lens logo can be found on Chaves’ helmet as he aims to make history on Sunday, May 28th at the Indy 500.
After being named Rookie of the Year in 2015, Chaves had problems with his vision deteriorating and was issued a restricted IndyCar license for the 2016 IndyCar season, where he tried to make do with heavy prescription glasses and soft contact lenses – both of which were very uncomfortable for him when driving. Even with the glasses and soft contacts, he was still very close to failing the yearly Indy Car eye exam for the 2017 season. When the IndyCar eye doctor expressed serious concerns about this, Chaves took matters into his own hands. In February 2017, he found an eye care practitioner who performed a Corneal Cross Linking procedure and prescribed him Onefit™ Scleral Lenses. Not only does Chaves now have better than 20/20 vision in both eyes and an unrestricted IndyCar license, he also told Blanchard recently: “Today was opening day for practice, and for once I didn’t even have to think about my eye comfort or sight all day.”
The Onefit™ platform of scleral lenses are designed with minimal lens mass and tear lens thickness to deliver optimal oxygenation to the cornea. From inception, Onefit lenses were designed to meet or exceed Holden-Mertz, Harvitt-Bonanno criteria for optimum oxygenation of the cornea and limbal stem cells. The platform of lenses offer a wide variety of design applications for many different indications.
“We designed Onefit scleral lenses to provide an array of benefits, many of which make them the ideal choice for athletes or active individuals such as Gabby Chaves” said Jean Blanchard, President of Blanchard Contact Lenses. “We are happy that Gabby shared his success story with us, and are excited to support him in the Indy 500 and look forward to a continued partnership” added Blanchard.