Cycle News

VOL. 53 ISSUE 23 JUNE 14, 2016 P109 back from Europe (after getting hurt), Dave and Roger came to my house and Roger asked if I wanted to take a year off to heal up, saying they would pay me $40,000. Since they were not obligated to pay me anything, I agreed. Towards the end of that year, I started working hard, training and riding the same as in past years. I wanted to race, so we went out for a test session to see how my speed was. When I realized I wasn't where I needed to be, I told Roger that I was done racing." Donnie shifted his focus towards developing his success- ful "Donnie Hansen Motocross Academy," which can be found at www.dhma.com. We all know that injuries are part of the game, they always have been and there is no deny- ing that. On any given Saturday at the Nationals, I would bet that over 75% of the riders on the line are racing with some type of injury, whether it's an ankle that they tweaked during the super- cross season, a wrist they keep reinjuring at the practice track, or a knee that they know needs surgery, but will have to wait. Once a rider tweaks something, it initiates a snowball effect that seemingly never ends, because they refuse to take the time off to allow it to heal completely. Bryan McDonald, who has been training and coaching aspiring supercross racers in his Privateer Racing League for years, agrees. "I guess you have to look at it the same as football players," he says. "Riding injured is a given and during the supercross season every one of our riders is usually nursing an injury of some kind." That philosophy jibes with my own experience, which was back when dinosaurs walked the earth and MX bikes had two shocks in the back. I was always riding injured and like every other racer, I sucked it up (or taped it up), got used to it and it became my new baseline. I never came close to finishing an entire season without getting hurt and heading home. When I say, "getting hurt," I am talk- ing plaster or surgery, not to be confused with being injured. The reason that riders continue to race even while injured is that they lose a little bit of an edge every time they miss a race. The more time spent off the bike, the harder it is to get back to speed. A common denominator shared by the titans of our sport is the ability to manage injuries. Hannah, Johnson, McGrath, Carmichael, Villopoto, Reed and Stewart, etc., all of these riders were very good at not missing races due to injury. All of them were also injured badly enough at some point in their career to keep them off the bike for a substantial period of time, but only Carmichael, Villopoto and Reed were able to return to their former pace, and I think each of them did it a couple of times. Of the others, I don't think Bob's heart was ever really back into racing after Tripes splayed him on the rocks at the River; John- son tried, but his wrist injury was insurmountable; McGrath was basically done before he ever threw a leg over the KTM that closed out his career. The jury is still out on whether James Stewart can regain the speed he lost during his Adder- all-induced layoff (pun intended) and recent injuries, as it is with Eli Tomac. Tomac's membership in the above group of legends lasted less than a month and ended in Colorado one year ago, when he tore both rota- tor cuffs in a violent crash. His comeback has been disappoint- ing so far and changing brands does not seem to have helped. I did not include Ryan Dung- ey's name in my list of unbeat- able riders because I have never considered him unbeatable at any given race. It seems counter-intuitive, considering his dominance this year. In any event, his fractured C-6 verte- bra is being portrayed as no big deal, with a projected 6-8 weeks off the bike, and hopefully that is true. Hey, it's only a broken neck, right? Get well soon, Ryan, and that goes for all the rest of you injured warriors, too! CN

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