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Road To 2012
Liam Phillips Injured At Season Opener

Posted February 22 2011
Words And Photography By Luke Webber

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British Cycling BMX Academy rider and Olympian Liam Phillips is out injured following a crash in the first international race weekend of the 2011 season.

Suffering a crushed radius head, a fractured ulna and a fractured elbow, Phillips sustained the injuries days after arriving in America for an extended training camp with British Cycling's Olympic BMX Coach Grant White.

Lining up at the ABA Gator Nationals on a gate which contained the biggest names, Phillips crashed out on the second day of racing and returned home immediately to see medical specialists, who assessed the full extent of the damage before carrying out surgery.

Last week, Phillips' radius was placed back together with a number of plates and screws and on Friday it will be determined then whether his elbow fracture will also require surgery.

Describing the crash, White recalls a mêlée of riders going to ground.

"Liam became tangled with two other riders at the bottom of the start ramp; his momentum saw him travel through the air and land heavily on his hand/wrist/elbow into the face of the first jump. He was taken by ambulance to a nearby hospital - after receiving pain medication to assist in controlling the severe pain where X-rays confirmed that Liam had a number of fractures in his wrist, and also elbow. Travel plans were adjusted overnight for Liam and I to return to UK the next day."

Following a successful initial surgery, typical recovery time is around eight weeks which would put Phillips out of the first World Cup of the season. However, Grant White expects training to resume in the next two weeks working around the injury.