Any "hero" stories of broken-bone riders returning early to race?

When Rossi broke his leg, I thought "Sit the season out, or at least
three races!" What has he got to prove? He doesn't need to hurry
it. Why on earth would he get back in there any sooner?

Then I realized that he's a motorcycle racer: where else would he be
but on a MotoGP bike? I remember seeing Doohan riding early, falling
off, and standing up and climbing on with that leg at a horrible
angle. Wasn't there a Japanese rider who raced the day after breaking
his ankle, and fell in the race, and got up and continued?

Has anyone got a favourite memory of a "hero" return under painful
circumstances, to share with someone who was in plaster for six weeks
for a bust ankle, and who limped for a year??!

 

Poor bloody infantry asks:

DuHamel 1999? on crutches and won Daytona superbike and
supersport.

Ricky Carmichael 2004, ACL reconstruction then won every
moto in the AMA motocross season.


Go fast. Take chances.
Mike S.

 

Ah, Duhamel --- there was a documentary wasn't there, in his trailer
he peeled off the top of his leathers and pulled off a bandage to
reveal that a pin-repaired collarbone had started to poke out of his
skin --- but he was going to race that day. A hard man.

 

Toughest guys that spring to mind right away:
Duhamel and Doohan: like everyone else, amazed at these guys.
Yanagawa- back on bike 3 weeks after coma inducing wreck at Laguna
1998.
Marco Melandri- 2006
Ricky Carmichael- Pontiac 2002
Any rider that's ever sawed off a cast to race (1970's)
Jay Springsteen- stomach issues (internal are horrible)
Wayne Rainey, running a Moto GP weeks after paralyzing himself.
Shinya Nakano- 190 mph high side at Mugello when tire blew out in
qualifying. Raced next day. Puig, by contrast, quit after similar
accident.

 

"Wayne Rainey, running a Moto GP weeks after paralyzing himself."

I meant "team"... TEAM...

 

Don't have the stomach for it myself. If Rossi falls on the right
(wrong) leg it is sure to re-break, I don't quite understand what
makes these guys risk permanent health problems for a weekend buzz.
Its not like I've never raced but I've never broken any bones and when
I came close to breaking my leg at a local race track I packed it in
for the rest of the season! a voice inside me said "That fu**ing hurt,
I'm going to think long and hard about why exactly I should work up to
National racing and I'll take more than a year to do it"... some
role model eh?

 

That was amazing, and under-reported indeed.

I seem to recall Puig suffered a brain injury?

Other notable injured riders: Pat Hennen (70s). Barry Sheene (did he
ever race without an injury?).

 

heh, sometimes you just nail it.

 

Treatment for bone spurs in the shoulder is - you guessed
it! - remove 2" off the end of the clavicle. Shoulder seems to work
just fine.


Go fast. Take chances.
Mike S.

 

If Rossi falls on the right (wrong) leg it is sure to re-break

Healing time for a tib & fib fracture is 6 - 8 weeks. Rossi is still
walking on crutches and it looks very painful. My experience of wound
healing is that if it is still painful it ain't back to strength.

 

Champ wrote:

[Rossi]

And now cleared to race on Sunday!
http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/motorsport/motorbikes/8795830.stm

 

I hope they did the old UK club racing trick. If you can jump off this
chair onto your broken leg, you can race.

 

I'm assuming a failure of a concussion test is therefore more likely
to have one stood-down than having a leg with metal bits holding the
bones together.
Things as they should be

 

Affairs are better than they used to be, the worst recent example was
Wayne Rainey, crashing at Donington and fracturing a vertebrae in his
back. Sliping under the radar with that one he raced at the Czech
Republic and then at Misano where he crashed and broke his now
weakened back. Obviously knowing about the fracture but racing anyway
is what I find extraordinary, back then I guess if a rider could
verbally convince a Doctor he could race half the argument was won but
even now some of the tales about bandage jobs make me feel queasy.
Of course the next post will F and blind about it being 'up to the
racer' etc but that looks like the same red mist that puts plenty of
riders into hospital anyway, and thats my point. Half these people
never get to figure out that if its such an obsession to race above
all else then it might be that they start placing their very existence
second to being the competitor. Devil... Soul?

 

Robert Dunlop (RIP) comes to mind here.

 

add to that anyone who dies at IOM.
freedom of choice v liklihood of death or injury

 

add to that anyone who dies at IOM.
freedom of choice v liklihood of death or injury

 

Of course we can think of a number of riders and I see that freedom of
choice has raised its head but we don't live in that sort of society.
A good example has been provided for us namely Guy Martin who crashed
at the TT this year. He has been told he cannot race at the Southern
100, Olivers Mount etc, the point being here - he has asked to - and
he has said that he has so little strength in his back that he cannot
lift the front wheel of his Mountain Bike out when it goes into a rut.
If the likes of you and me were working for a tyre fitting company and
did our back in it would be 3 months off and no complaint but not
these guys, oh no. So I do wonder if its only a grisly spectacle at
times and what about the people who pay to see it? It would be nice to
think things are getting better. Do I think Guy Martin's a hero? a
hero for what cause? If he was to race and risk severe injury or death
he would be a fool to himself and the idea of racing in that condition
is one that would have one questioning his sanity as we do when people
from other walks of life needlessly endanger themselves, you know,
suicides, drug addicts, er who else does it? and whenever I hear of a
rider strapping himself up and lapping a circuit I just don't get it.

 

9/10. You should have used the subjunctive here, i.e. "If he were to
race..." but otherwise, well done.