Update: Gee Atherton ‘Not Too Bad’ After Massive Rampage Crash

Is there any more info about what exactly happened?  It looked like he landed pretty much exactly where I thought he would have had to but then it seemed like he got pinged off the bike pretty instantly.    Super impressive how in control he was with the takeoff, speed and in the air.  It’s difficult to imagine how you can make yourself do that

edit:reading the comments it seems he may have landed a bit too far down.  Doesn’t look like there is any margin for error 🙁

That’s 100m+ horizontal though – the vertical, albeit considerable, is less.

“ski flying” is apparently the term for extreme ski jumping which goes well beyond Olympic parameters. They can reach in excess of 200m distance, and around 100m vertical drop from take-off to landing. It’s a bit different due to the lift from the skis (and body position) but still basically a fall from height onto a slope.

Rewatched the bit of Matt Jones’ video (2:30 in https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pi9R_Akb5vo ) and I think he landed about here:

I’ve got mixed feelings about it. It’s amazing what they do; what gives me the fear might as well be hopping off a lowered kerb in comparison.

I don’t think the ‘think of the children’ (copying) argument is worth anything, there’s a billion things in the world children copy. Weren’t they (the children we’re thinking of) strangling each other at one point (or am I thinking of politicians/celebrities in sex dungeons/etc?)? Sorry bit of a tangent there! Not buying the ‘its just marketing’ argument either, it’s a factor of course, but it’s the spectacle of it, and marketing always hijacks that.

The riders are professionals at this, but, who is there with them, is it just dig crew bros and rider (and close family)? Shouldn’t there be a whole host of other professionals there too, for example as in the world DH championships etc?

I can’t pretend to know Gee in any way whatsoever, but can’t help thinking, now we know the conditions had stopped other riders, there should have been someone there who could have advised him to stop who he would have listened to.

I can’t pretend to know Gee in any way whatsoever, but can’t help thinking, now we know the conditions had stopped other riders, there should have been someone there who could have advised him to stop who he would have listened to.

Isn’t one of his diggers Dan, his brother? If you’re not listening to Dan, no one else is going to cut it.

Gee Atherton:

“meh, I just broke my back and my head, both in several places, nothing too bad, I’ll be jumping off stupid high cliffs again in a week or two”

🤘

So happy he’s “ok”

Two nasty head injuries in three years. I hope someone is advising him to pause and work out if he’s actually escaped serious injury before he starts hitting it again.

A broken skull and back is not serious? It’s about as serious as it gets, unless you class death as an injury

He will have life changing injuries from this and his other crashes, maybe not immediately but in years to come when biking is no longer an income for him he will really suffer

The fact you’re questioning this means you’ll simply never ‘get it’ you’ll never get the mindset. When you’re that involved, that absorbed, everything else doesn’t exist, the consequences in later life don’t matter, look at racers like Mick Doohan, Joey Dunlop, look at the Free Climber guys, they do it because, well, they’re doing it whether you, I or anyone else agrees or approves. Gee seems to be the same, he does it because he wants to, because it what drives him. He’ll wake up tomorrow and go “oooooh that hurts” and in 4 weeks, 6 weeks, he’ll completely forget the pain from today and be wanting to get back out again.

I was of the same sort of mindset when racing motorbikes (but will less skill obviously) and even when shattering a femur, breaking many many bones, my first job when getting out of hospital was to see my bike and get my mate to start repairs so i could race again. The bike was fixed before i was, but that didn’t stop me racing again. I wanted to race the TT, that was my goal and my aim, but i wasn’t good enough to make it.

I’m not trying to tell Gee what to do, but in my head he’s becoming the MTB version of Mickey Rourke in The Wrestler.

On another note, so why do they hold Rampage on a Friday anyway?

The fact you’re questioning this means you’ll simply never ‘get it’ you’ll never get the mindset.

I get it. But it’s neither healthy nor admirable, despite what some on here might say.

It’s denial and willy waving.

Having had two broken vertebrae (and now missing half of one), it’s serious. I still suffer 8 years on.

Isn’t there a difference between broken and fractured, where i think fractured can be a teeny tiny crack, broken being separation ?

So glad he didn’t sustain more serious injuries

A broken skull and back is not serious? It’s about as serious as it gets, unless you class death as an injury

I meant, in addition to …
Badly phrased.

Oh I absolutely do get it – I was chucking myself of cliffs on skis in my teenage years and 20’s doing stuff that could have easily killed me and others.

But with age comes wisdom (in theory). At some point you have to realise you skills are not as they were, and your body is not what it was, and therefore you cant keep doing the same things. I fully agree that no one was making Gee do this but he does need to come to peace at some point with where he is in life unless he wants to end up dead

Coolio.

I agree, there does… but he’s not going to listen to random people on the internets comments that he’ll never see. 🙂

But with age comes wisdom (in theory). At some point you have to realise you skills are not as they were, and your body is not what it was, and therefore you cant keep doing the same things.

But it shouldn’t just be Gee’s decision, it should be Red Bulls as both his sponsor and event organiser.    In my view, Gee shouldn’t have been given a entry based on his age and injury history.
Gee will always think he is capable and will continue, but it’s the responsibility of others to determine if he should be given the platform to do it.

Gee will always think he is capable and will continue, but it’s the responsibility of others to determine if he should be given the platform to do it.

No it’s not… that’s like telling Minaar he should retire as he’s too old..

It’s his choice, if he’s not hitting features as part of a RedBull event, he’ll be hitting it as part of Atherton Bikes, or Dyfi, or etc etc.

Gee will always think he is capable and will continue, but it’s the responsibility of others to determine if he should be given the platform to do it.

No it’s not… that’s like telling Minaar he should retire as he’s too old..

Sounds like it’s a bit of both for this one, although others aren’t responsible they can try and influence. He’s not just in a simple state of getting older, he’s now got multiple skull and spinal fractures not long after another set of very serious injuries (not just the ‘normal’ mtb stuff or a wrist here, a tib/fib there, collar bone there, etc). There’s a good chance that there’s a doctor somewhere telling him it’s time to stop after so many injuries.

Lets not forget that he’s hit his helmet hard enough to break his head. Hopefully he’ll not end up going a similar way as the likes of Dave Mirra