Horror injury strongman ‘may never compete again’
BBC
A strongman whose horrific injury went viral on social media has said he might have run his final race.
Dan Jones ripped both patellar tendons when he raced with 80kg during a strongman contest in Southport at the beginning of September.
He has spent weeks in hospital, missing his daughter’s first day of nursery and her learning to crawl.
Having undergone surgery and been discharged from Leighton Hospital in Crewe on Friday, Mr Jones said: “My biggest goal is to get home and be a dad. If I can train and compete after that, that’s a bonus.”
Mr Jones described the moment of the injury on 1 September, which has been viewed on TikTok more than 2.6 million times.
He said it had felt like he was “on fire”.
Dan Jones
“It was horrendous,” Mr Jones said. “Every time I looked down I felt sick because you could see the kneecaps about two or three inches higher than they should have been.
“I’d have probably been better off breaking a leg.”
He said the doctors had been baffled as to how the injury occurred.
“We still don’t know why the first one went. It’s crazy. This was actually the lightest event and the safest one,” he said, having picked up a car and pulled a truck earlier that day.
“Possibly it’s a wear and tear from the rest of the day.”
Some US strongmen who have previously suffered the same injury have contacted Mr Jones, explaining they were in casts and could not walk for three months.
“I’m doing pretty good considering I only got operated on three-and-a-half weeks ago,” he said.
He has since celebrated taking his first steps after the injury, but added being in hospital had reminded him how important training and family time was for mental health.
“My 11-month old daughter – I’ll have missed her first day of nursery, I’ve missed her crawling, I’ve missed her trying to pull herself up,” he said.
“It’s very sad but it’s such a hard thing to get my head around. It’s been very hard on the brain.”
He now looks forward to getting home and celebrating his daughter’s first birthday.
