On January 24, 2022, Egan Bernal almost died. The then-25-year-old was out on a training ride with teammates in Gachancipá, Colombia, on his time trial bike, when he didn't notice that a bus in front of him had stopped to drop off passengers. He collided with the back of the bus at roughly 60 km/h and was taken to hospital with a raft of serious injuries, some of them life-threatening.
In the days afterwards, Bernal revealed that doctors had given him a 95% chance of ending up a paraplegic. Instead, he made a stunning recovery, returning to competition by August that year.
While Bernal is yet to reach the great heights he did pre-2022 crash – he won the Tour de France in 2019, and the Giro d'Italia in 2021 – his comeback is still remarkable when you consider the severity of his injuries. Those injuries and their treatment are the subject of a new research paper out of the University La Sabana in Colombia – the institution connected with the hospital Bernal was treated at.
Based on the paper, it's fair to say Bernal was very lucky indeed.
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