The Olympics are a proud time for many countries and athletes, and they always bring us a great story or two. Enter Canadian snowboarder Mark McMorris who won bronze in the men’s slopestyle Sunday in PyeongChang.
An amazing accomplishment for McMorris considering he was involved in a near-fatal crash 11 months earlier and had no idea if he’d be able to walk ever again.
Per Yahoo!:
“In March, McMorris was riding in the backcountry near Whistler, British Columbia, when he went off a jump and crashed into a tree, resulting in a broken jaw, broken left arm, ruptured spleen, a pelvic fracture, rib fractures and a collapsed lung. The photo above was the result.”
McMorris was knocked unconscious from the fall and was airlifted to Vancouver for emergency surgery.
Mark had this to say about his time in the hospital:
“I didn’t think I’d ever snowboard again when I was laying there after I hit that tree. I was awake and was waiting. As soon as the helicopter got there (90 minutes later) I went to sleep. I remember the whole time waiting, just trying to survive because (I) ruptured (my) spleen and all that and my jaw was just hanging. I was puking. I thought I was going to die — literally.”
Mark spent 10 days in the hospital which was followed by an insane recovery process that included a liquid diet that lasted six weeks and hours of daily physical therapy.
The 24-year-old was back it after an insane amount of hard work and was snowboarding at a world-class level not long after, all things considered. Check out this inspirational video of him below.
Congrats to you, Mark!
(h/t Yahoo!)
