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Literally not surprised. Its even on PC's rider bio page. All I did was search the word "injury" and 7 hits came up from the last 7 years of his career...wow. And he's crashed out of a lot more races than they summarized here.
forkner said that his contact lens popped out of his eye and that may affected his judgement on that rhythm lane. there use to be a company that made prescription goggle lenses. not sure if they are still in business but if so that would be better to have the lenses than your contact lenses popping out ... dont some of you wear glasses when you ride ?
I will say I had a contact lense pop out wearing Scott Prospects as well. They vent really well and let a lot of air in, which dried my lense out.
Fro said he electrical tapes his goggle vents to keep his eyes from watering
For the casual racer/fan like me, this is what I don't understand. Its the end of the race, track is getting super sketchy, mistakes are happening at speed, you have a MASSIVE points lead, you are riding with 1/2 vision, why not back it down and take a 2nd or 3rd? Tomac just did in Detroit due to arm pump, zero shame in that, went from being lapped to 2nd place this week. I have been a fan since he was an amateur and wish him nothing but the best but its frustrating. RC even said right before the crash, this is the point in the race where he needs to manage the mistakes and back it down if necessary, race for a title not race wins. Something doesn't seem to let him do that. It reminds me of the football player RG3, who outplayed his body. An awful, awful crash, I hope we see him again, nobody deserves his luck. That look on his face was haunting, you could see he was completely gutted...........
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Hindsight’s always 20/20. I’m sure Forkner’s kicking himself over that same thing. He was riding good though, and was just flowing around the track. Also, the track might’ve changed just a little in that part… maybe.
The rider doesn't deploy the airbag, I believe it is automatic. MX application could use a tether perhaps
Sorry if I missed it??? Is Forkner alright?
He'll obviously recover from this physically. How much does this affect him mentally though? Is it going to be constantly in his head, waiting for that shoe to drop and "bad luck" to come. Or can these pros keep pushing through these things?
Thanks for taking the spot light off me dude. There’s always someone dumber 😂
Obviously there's always a "last straw," but if he can come back from getting rag dolled 30' out of the gate at A1 last year to ride the way he did this year, I think he can do it again.
Watching the replay of Glendale this evening, Thrasher’s wreck there was basically a mirror image of Forkners!! He would have probably had some serious injury if it wasn’t for the dirt being packed in between the jumps and landing on it with his back instead of the stadium floor 3/4 ft below!
Hoping Austin’s recovery goes well and he can get back to where he was! Was hoping to see him have an awesome, injury free year for a change. That was definitely heart wrenching to watch, gutted for him!
I hope so. I'm still feeling it for him, days later. I was the furthest thing from a fan of his until this year. But I was pulling for him so much. I was totally feeling like this was going to be his year like 2019 was for AC
My exact thought. Even without the massive points lead, if my vision is compromised I’m backing it down and being fine with a 2nd place finish. But we don’t know everything. Maybe there was something else making him keep take the risks.
Forkner's resume..
Wow. That’s very telling
A demo of the Alpine Stars Airbag tech - I think it's now compulsory in the Dakar? :
https://www.youtube.com/shorts/RLzRqUVOGuc
No doubt some here will get all upset about it , but, it's out there (I think it's being sold / about to be sold?) , and, some may choose to use it.
I don’t think this makes your case. Can we see a graph or pie chart next? Seriously though, when we’re at our local races I generally can pick out the kids who are more prone to crashing. Some riders are like that. The difference is when they go down I don’t yell to the crowd “I knew it! Is anyone surprised that kid just wadded? Haha” that would be ignorant ya know?
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I don't know how the tech works. But in moto gp. Does it deploy on all crashes or only over a certain speed?
Coz if it deployed for eli or in either of jetts crashes there race would be over. I think the downsides would outweigh the rewards.
Dare I say it, that would make you an asshole
I truly don’t get why people are so upset at those of us pointing out it’s the same exact thing every season. 2022 was the only one where it was truly just bad luck. Are we supposed to pretend this isn’t normal? None of us want to see injuries and we all want to see the best guys out there every round. We all want him to make a quick recovery and be 100%. This doesn’t change the facts. He has to back it down a bit and ride in control. He was sketchy all day Saturday and kept pushing. That crash was inevitable.
Why does his resume only include failures?
I know your trying to compare it to Deegans so they both look similar after 1 year if you ask me.
On the title 24 podcast both ricky and villopoto explain that this crash wasnt due to bad luck. Villopoto showed how mcelrath and hunter both cased it as bad or worse, but they did the right things with their body positions and knowing they had to adjust to save it and they made it through. Vuillemin also had a similar take on his podcast. He said how jett got squirley and landed on a tough block but he landed full brakes clutch in and had just a small tip over. If his contact did fall out Id say that could be considered bad luck I guess, but either way he still prob should have backed it down and took a 2nd or 3rd. Absolutely sucks to see what happened. Hopefully he learns from this and comes back better.
Different angle of the crash
DV12's podcast talks about how he shouldn't have crashed either. He pointed out his hands are fully on the bars, not a finger on the clutch or brake in case of an issue. So he was committed to just jump it as if it was normal. But even DV said, "anybody that's ridden for a while, you know as soon as you take off if you are going to be short or long." And Austin didn't even calculate where he was landing or what the outcome was going to be. Its as if he wasn't even paying attention, or he can't process the information fast enough for his riding speed. DV also went back to qualifying where he had multiple timing issues in the rhythm before the whoops, landing long and almost smashing his face on the handlebars. Either way the kid has a massive track record for crashing. I'm not glad the kid crashed, or hating on him. Its just beyond ridiculous the kid keeps crashing so hard and never learning from his mistakes. This one was avoidable, no matter how many of you say otherwise.
Either that or his contact fell out so for what he was perceiving he was correct...
Who tf brought up Deegan? This is a Forkner thread.. And his resume of crashing out is insanely relevant when we're having a literal discussion of this crash and his crash to injury history over his ENTIRE CAREER.
Looked like he had no split-second internal debate on trying to save it or bail. He just let go! Terrible hit.
Yea that definitely could explain why he didnt have react as if he was going to come up short. In that case though he should have backed it down and switched to the safer line through that section and just brought it home. Its always easy to monday morning quarterback it but I’m sure Austin prob feels he should have done that also with how the result turned out. I’m absolutely gutted for the dude and this really puts a damper on the east championship now.
I feel like guys come up short like that so often that they really don't think much of it. Bike usually soaks it up and on they go. I'm always blown away by it because I would die every time. This time it just got him.
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