Moereloos
Race Dog
With reference to https://wilddog.net.za/forum/index.php?topic=120838.0
Until a few weeks ago, I had never heard of Sampie Erasmus. His story below from https://www.roadtorio.co.za/2010/08/20/meet-x-rated-sampie/
Sadly I could not go to the 'Drive and Thrive' expo this year where he gave a demonstration, as we had booked a weekend away before hearing about it. If I think that my back is broken in the the same place (T4 - T6) and I sometimes battle to get out of the bed let alone into a car, this man is a huge inspiration...
Until a few weeks ago, I had never heard of Sampie Erasmus. His story below from https://www.roadtorio.co.za/2010/08/20/meet-x-rated-sampie/
South Africa’s latest sporting hero is paraplegic motorbike rider Samuel “Sampie” Erasmus (28), who famously sold his car, a Golf 5, so he could compete in X Games 16 in Los Angeles last month.
He got R195,000 for the car and it turned out to be the best trade of his life because he won gold at the equivalent of the action sports Olympics.
Incredibly, Sampie competes in moto X super X — he’s one of those crazy guys you see racing around a dirt track on motorbikes, flying over custom-made jumps and bumps which are sculpted by small bulldozers.
It’s hard enough for able-bodied riders to stay on their bikes, but Sampie is paralysed from the chest down as the result of a motorbike accident in 2004.
So he can’t even stand up like normal riders — or even the amputee riders he competes against — when he’s on the jumps to absorb the impact. Instead, he relies on his considerable upper body strength, great bike control and balance.
At the made-for-television X Games, broadcast in South Africa by sponsors ESPN, Sampie, who is from Stilfontein, competed in an event called moto X super X adaptive, which is open to amputees and paraplegics.
This year, for the first time, the paras were considered to be in a separate class, although they compete in the same race as amputees, and sixth place was good enough to give Sampie gold because he was the first paraplegic across the line.
In previous years, there were no medals for the paras.
“I’m the fastest paraplegic in the world,” he said afterwards when I saw him in the pits at the Los Angeles Coliseum.
It nearly went horribly wrong for Erasmus at the start of the final, when he was knocked off the track at the first jump and passed by another para rider.
But he immediately got back on track and quickly found his rhythm to wrestle back the lead — and the cherished medal.
Last year, in his first X Games appearance in the moto X super X adaptive, Sampie was the second paraplegic rider, but no medals were at stake.
X Games gold is as big as it gets in action sport and his success has put Erasmus on the same exalted level as other well-known SA disabled sports stars, people such as 400m “Blade Runner” Oscar Pistorius, wheelchair marathon man Ernst van Dyk and swimming sensation Natalie du Toit.
Every disabled sport is a challenge but Sampie’s chosen field is particularly difficult.
Erasmus had to build a cage on the bike to protect his legs and he has to strap himself into a special seat. His legs have to be strapped in, too, so the last thing a paraplegic motorbike rider needs is to fall during an event.
Quite simply, he cannot get up without assistance, and it was heart-breaking in the adaptive final in LA to see one paraplegic rider crash on a corner and lie where he fell until marshals raced in up to pick him up.
Erasmus’s bike, a Honda CRF 250X, is modified with a special clutch, a left hand back brake and a left hand clutch override. He changes gear with a grip shift he designed himself.
The accident which changed Sampie’s life happened in the 2004 SA moto X championships in Bethlehem. Already an accomplished moto X rider on the verge of turning professional, he was competing in the 125cc senior event when he hit a jump, his back wheel hit a bump and he flew over the handlebars.
“The bike followed me,” he said. “It landed on me and broke my back in two places.” Erasmus’s spine was damaged between the T4 and T6 vertebrae, confining him to a wheelchair for the rest of his life.
But Erasmus is made from stern stuff and six months after his accident he got on a friend’s 450cc motorbike in Orkney and “bumped around in second gear”.
“I knew then I could do it,” he said, and so his great adventure started.
That was a far cry from the young man who came home from the rehab centre and realised life would never be the same. ”It hit me hard when I rolled into the house,” Sampie recalled.
But he only allowed himself two weeks of self-pity before he realised that life was for living, no matter was your handicap is.
The rules of Motorsport SA preclude paraplegic riders from competing in their events but after teaching himself how to do moto X again on a modified bike on a makeshift track near his home, Erasmus learnt that he would be welcomed with open arms in the US.
“There, I can compete with able-bodied riders without any problems,” said Erasmus, who headed stateside last year.
He competed in the 2009 Extremity Games for people with disabilities and earned an invitation to X Games 15. He was back in the US this year, thanks to the cash he got from selling his car, and won his class at the Extremity Games. Then it was the X Games, and the achievement of his dream.
Sadly I could not go to the 'Drive and Thrive' expo this year where he gave a demonstration, as we had booked a weekend away before hearing about it. If I think that my back is broken in the the same place (T4 - T6) and I sometimes battle to get out of the bed let alone into a car, this man is a huge inspiration...
