ELIAS PERFORMS HEROICS AT BRNO
Melandri misses out due to an exposed hernia in his neck
Toni Elias won his own personal battle at Brno as he returned
to track just two months after his crash at Assen, recovering
in record time from a broken femur.
The Spaniard started the race from the fifth row of the grid
and battled all the way to the end despite intense pain in
his leg, fighting it out with West, Guintoli, Checa and Barros
to take an incredible eleventh place finish.
Marco Melandri was forced to watch the race from the pit
garage after suffering an exposed discal hernia between the
C5 and C6 vertebrae during free practice.
TONI ELIAS (11th in the race, 13th in the championship
on 54 points): "I'm really proud and satisfied
to have finished the race. Considering my physical condition,
eleventh place is not bad. Brno features a lot of direction
changes and it's very demanding on the body so I struggled
a lot with the pain in my leg. Now we have two more weeks
of hard work ahead to try and recover as well as possible
and be ready for Misano, my team's home race. In fact, the
headquarters are just a few kilometres away in San Clemente."
MARCO MELANDRI (6th in the championship on 113 points):
"It was frustrating having to watch the race from the
pit wall, especially having worked really hard over the summer
to recover from the broken ankle. My neck has been in some
pain ever since Laguna Seca but I never thought it would stop
me from racing here at Brno. Unfortunately on Friday morning
I had a hernia between the C5 and C6 vertebrae which put pressure
on the nerve and I lost all strength in my left arm and hand.
Now my only thought is to get fit as soon as possible and
make sure I am ready to race again at Misano".
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