Egan Bernal says he is 'back' after starting his recovery from a training accident in Colombia
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Updated 04/02/2022 at 09:44 GMT
Egan Bernal says he is going through "his toughest race" as he recovers from his serious training accident. The 25-year-old crashed into a parked bus last week while riding in his native Colombia, and has subsequently undergone seven rounds of surgery to repair a mammoth list of injuries that he listed on his Instagram.
Egan Bernal is on the road to recovery
Image credit: Getty Images
Egan Bernal has revealed the enormous list of injuries that he suffered as a result of his training accident in Colombia last week.
Bernal crashed into a parked bus while time-trial riding in his native Colombia, an incident that left him requiring seven major surgeries.
And he took to social media for just the second time since the incident to share news of his progress, which involved a list of all the bones he had broken: 11 ribs, one femur, a kneecap, T5 and T6 vertebrae, C2 vertebrae, a metacarpal, and one broken thumb.
The 25-year-old said: "I almost killed myself, but do you know what? I am grateful to God for putting me through this test.
"This is the toughest race, but I have had a group of excellent people around me.
"Yesterday I had my last major surgery and everything seems to have gone well.
"So now to recovery and to doing it again. I'm back!! And let's rock."
Medics had feared that Bernal would be 95% paraplegic as a result of the accident but following the final surgery on his cervical vertebrae, they confirmed that he had not suffered any damage to his spinal cord.
Bernal, the reigning Giro d'Italia champion and 2019 Tour de France winner, doesn't have to look far for inspiration as he starts on what will undoubtedly be a lengthy path to recovery.
Ex-Ineos team-mate Chris Froome - now part of the Israel-Premier Tech team - suffered a similarly horrific crash in 2019, but has made it back to elite cycling.
Talking earlier this week, Froome hoped Bernal would be given the space he needs.
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