Part 1
On the 8thMarch 2008 I went snowboarding with my wife, Fee, and some friends to Geilo in Norway. One of my friends had a log cabin with no electricity or running water where we stayed for the week although a few, including my wife were only staying for the weekend. We had a fantastic time while we were there, plenty of snow and uncrowded slopes meant loads of boarding and there were lots of parks at Geilo ranging from beginners to very advanced (can you guess where this is leading?!).
On Thursday the 13th, having messed about on the beginner and intermediate parks earlier in the week, I decided that I would do one of the big jumps. I wasn't particularly worried as I have done a lot of big jumps in the past, including ones as big as this. I approached the ramp with good speed, as anyone who jumps knows one of the commonest mistakes is going too slow over the jumps! On the take off I noticed that the ramp was much steeper than I had thought and when I took off I had too much weight over the back of my board. This tends to flip you over on to your back in the air, which is exactly what happened to me. I remember being in the air with my head at the same level as my feet and looking at my board, I don't really remember being too scared, I have had more snowboard crashes than hot dinners and never hurt myself before. That was about to change.
Next thing I remember is hearing my friend Rune shouting my name as I was lying face down in the snow. I don't remember being in any great pain but I do remember having pins and needles in my legs. Next thing I know the ski patrol is there (I remember they were fairly cute) asking me what day it was. Now anyone that knows me will know that even on a good day there is not a very good chance I will know the answer to this question, so it wasn't a good choice for determining whether I had any head injuries! Given that I had been on holiday for a week in a cabin with no electricity I definitely had no idea what day it was, but I tried to tell the ski patrol that it wasn't because I had a head injury. Fortunately they asked me what my name was and my date of birth, both of which I knew! Don't ask me how they knew, because I can't remember telling them anything about what was wrong with me, but they then put me on the spine board. I managed to roll onto this myself and my kind friends took some photos of me – see below.
Me on Stretcher - Photo Soon
They took me to the medical centre at the resort where they x-rayed my back. Again I don't know why as I don't remember feeling any pain there, good medical practice I guess, but I am grateful they did. They said that I had a fractured vertebra, but it didn't look too bad. However they were going to send me to another hospital for a more detailed look. At this stage I remember not being too concerned. I could feel and move everything and I thought they would say it was a stable fracture and I would just be out for 6 weeks.
It was half an hours journey in the ambulance to the nearest hospital, Rune stayed with me to keep me company. It wasn't the most comfortable half hour in my life but it didn't last to long. At the hospital I was x-rayed pretty much straight away, but it wasn't good news. The doctors told me that they thought the fracture may be unstable and that I would need to have a CT scan to diagnose this further. Unfortunately the nearest CT scanner was at Honefoss which was 2 hours away.
This two hours was not very pleasant. The roads in Norway, particularly in the snow, are fairly bumpy and being strapped to a hard spine board does not make for a comfortable ride. The doctors had told me that I must keep totally still but I found this impossible, I had to keep moving and bending my legs to try to make myself comfortable. At this stage the seriousness of the situation had still not got through to me, I still thought that the CT scan would show a minor fracture. Unfortunately that was not to be.