For those of you that don’t know, rider Paul Basagoitia was competing in the Red Bull Rampage on October 16th when he over jumped a step-down and crashed. Obviously no one was quite sure of the extent of his injuries, but it was serious. He was air lifted off the hill and taken to hospital. We soon learnt that all was not good for Paul. Fellow rider and friend Cam Zink posted this on his Instagram the day after the event:

“@camzink Everyone send Paul Basagoitia positive vibes! This champion has started a long road to recovery after shattering his T12 vertebrae yesterday and undergoing 9 hours of surgery. He had a winning run going and may have set the record for biggest step down just before going down. Lots of tears have been shed. Keep Paul in your prayers to regain feeling in his legs. There were some horrible people spreading false news that he was OK, but he needs your support more than ever to walk again. Paul, you are the most tenacious human and competitor ever. Love you bud! You’ll be back!”

There was (and still is) a great outpouring of emotion from the whole of the mountainbike community, and also some anger. There have some strong opinions expressed on various websites and social media sites, raising questions about the levels of risk that riders are putting themselves under and the responsibilities of event organisers and sponsors. We don’t know the whole story, we are looking from the outside in, but what we do know is that Paul Basagoitia and his family and friends need our help.

What can you do? Please go to the Road 2 Recovery site here, read what it has to say and if you can, help them out.

Paul’s girlfriend Nichole Munk updated everyone on Oct 19th, “His chest tube that was put in to assist with access to his spine during surgery was removed today and he is such a fighter that he is already looking forward to rehab! This is all new territory for us and we are flooded with information right now, but he will beat this! Thank you to all the riders, sponsors, friends and people involved with the event that have shared their support”.

We are all thinking of you Paul.