Robbie Maddison Wrist Surgery

Transcript

I'm a little nervous to be here and feel this excitement again, but this will be one of those moments in my life. I think

this fighter has been living inside me since I was a child. Robbie is so confident as he approaches the edge of this 30- meter cliff. One day I saw another guy driving down the street

. He was on a little minibike , and I remember seeing it and it completely captivated me. This motorcycle alone would scare an

ordinary person. And from that moment on, it was just a crazy ride. And now comes the hardest part .

Crashed a lot of bikes, broke my head, and had all these injuries. It's like flying into the air to the height of a 10- story building

• that's not all. And every day that I get to ride my motocross bike is a blessing to me . Let's go.

Madness. Terrible. Deadly dangerous. Surprisingly. Invent something, do it, and then try to get out of it. This...

this is incredible. What else can be said? I dreamed of becoming the best freestyle rider, you know, on the planet, and deep down I believe I'm worthy of

it. Last year I worked hard, learned new tricks, improved old ones, and felt like I went to the X Games with something that would help me beat

everyone. He is now in second position. He's really trying to just stay calm, and I think at that point

the situation just got out of my control, and can he do better - that's the question. I actually remember

it quite clearly. I was performing a "body- virial." I just pulled into the ramp, tried to start the spin too early, and when I did

, the sole of my shoe caught on the seat and it just stopped my spin. So I was hanging in the air in weightlessness, unable to

reach the motorcycle to control it in any way, and I realized I was falling, and at that moment all I could see was Mother Nature, smiling and

waiting for me. To my great surprise , I got up, stood on my feet, moved my arms, nothing was dislocated, my legs were fine, my head was fine

too, and then I realized that something was wrong with my wrist. I couldn't even grab the steering wheel and hold it with any strength. My

wrist was completely weak, and I had to withdraw from the competition. This really brought me to tears. After my injury at the X Games, I just didn't want

to believe that my year was in jeopardy. A few weeks later, I went to London, performed there, but fell again on the same trick. After

that trip to London, I spoke to the Red Bull team and said that I was, you know, completely devastated. I needed help, and they said they would

take me to their doctors. We have the best doctors in the world. So I went to DISC for the first time to see Dr. Knight. You know, he explained to me

that with this injury I was taking a very big risk. Potentially, my career could have ended. When Robbie first came to me, it had

already been 2 months since his wrist injury , which had never been diagnosed. He had a very specific injury - a fractured

capitate bone. It is located right in the center of the wrist, it is usually broken only with very strong blows, it is a rare fracture. If this

happens, the treatment is unique, because the entire bone can simply die and crumble into a thousand pieces. Since time was of the

essence, I invited him to DISC for outpatient surgery, met with him that morning, and performed the procedure. See you when your arm

is okay. This is a very delicate operation. It needs to be done as soon as possible. Given this , aggressive treatment is needed , because a cast will

not help here. We had to clean the space between the bones, put everything in place, and surprisingly, it fell into place quite easily. And then

we secured everything with a few pins. Later that evening I was home on the couch and feeling quite comfortable. Over the next

few weeks, the hand healed. It was time to remove the pins and we saw the perfect alignment of the joint . So, it looked like I would

have almost 100% functioning wrist again. I have treated many elite athletes over the years, but for extreme

athletes there are different return-to-sport timelines. Robbie needed immediate intervention, and rehabilitation after such a procedure takes from 6

weeks to 3 months. He recovered in 5 weeks , which is simply phenomenal. With the perfect combination and perfect

setup, I was ready to get back on the bike as soon as possible. So you have to understand that I broke about 30 bones. I went

through all of this, so coming here was a real relief. I strive to be the best version of myself every day, and it's great to

see people in medicine striving for the best as well. For me, riding a motocross bike is about learning something new every day,

no matter what the day. In everything I do now, I'm constantly thinking: how am I doing this? Am I doing this correctly ? And for the jumps I

do now, there's only one right way; If I'm not attentive to every little thing, I'll just crash. And I don't want to crash. I

thank fate for my luck every day. Things started to get better last week, and that's really nice. I was told I would never ride a

motorcycle. I was told that my sight might never return. I was told that motocross was n't for me. Is there anything else you want to tell me?