Walker’s injection of hope

Chris Walker is still on the slow road to recovery from Bell’s Palsy, but he’s been boosted by a new treatment from his team’s physiotherapist.

He has been having painkilling and relaxant injections in his neck to try and cure the paralysis. Walker said: ” Most of my face is now much better. The only real problem is a bit of cod eye because I can’t blink that well. I’m going to keep having the treatment and see what happens. ”

Walker must avoid steroids which, although they would substantially reduce his recovery time, are banned by the FIM.

*Former GP racer Christian Bourgeois will run Walker’s WSB team in 2003. He’s taking over from Harald Eckl, who will head Kawasaki’s move to MotoGPs.