Le Mans MotoGP: Ben Spies hurt but not unhappy

Ben Spies refused to be too downhearted with his 12th position on the grid for tomorrow’s French MotoGP race after he escaped serious injury in a massive practice crash.

Spies braved the pain of a badly swollen left ankle to clock a best time of 1.34.920 in qualifying, just hours after he suffered a massive high-side in the morning’s final practice session. 

Spies lost control of his Monster Yamaha Tech 3 YZR-M1 on his third lap this morning, the Texan the victim of a cold Bridgestone rear tyre as he tipped into the Dunlop chicane.

The reigning World Superbike champion was thrown several metres through the air and landed heavily on his right side.

He needed to taken by stretcher to a trackside ambulance and he underwent lengthy treatment in the circuit’s medical centre that included X-rays on his left ankle.

Luckily the 25-year-old suffered no broken bones although he lost close to an hour of crucial track time in his preparation for his debut in the French MotoGP race.

Spies though has been advised to undergo further scans next week to detect any small cracks or hairline fractures in his left foot and ankle that failed to show up on the X-rays taken earlier today.

Spies said: “For missing most of the morning session I’m not too upset to be where I’m at. I’ll ice the ankle and make it a bit more comfortable for the race.

“The pain is not super bad, it’s just that I can’t move around like I want and I feel like I’m behind without everything on the bike. Even if I had put everything together I only had another couple of tenths in me, so it wasn’t like I was going to be in the top five.”

Explaining the incident, Spies added: “I think I just made a mistake. I definitely wasn’t starting a full-bore fast lap but I might have going a little too hard for the tyre at the time. I just screwed up a little bit and it caught me off guard.”

Spies though didn’t hurt his ankle when he hit the tarmac, but the damage was caused by the ferocity of the high-side.

He said: “The impact was on my elbow and shoulder and it wasn’t that bad. It threw me a long way but I didn’t get that high and came down pretty easy. It was right when it flicked me and my foot was half off the peg and when it snapped back it just completely rolled the ankle and the knee a little.

“There are no broken bones but something is going on with the ligaments. I’ll do an MRI next week but it’s nothing major or mind blowing. The pain level of riding is not that bad. It’s trying to move around on the bike fast enough because of the swelling and the way you pivot your ankle. But once the adrenaline gets going in the race it’ll be okay.”

One issue for Spies was using the foot to downshift gears and he said: “Mainly on the downshift moving my foot up, that’s the only pain part.  It’s a matter of getting my foot back into position for the corner after shifting. I have to move my whole leg. I’ll just see how good I can go tomorrow.

“It’ll be a little tough but one of those things that come race time it won’t hold me back. It doesn’t feel good now but hopefully for 28 laps I can put it out of my mind.”