Danny Summerhill crashes but avoids re-injuring separated shoulder
anny Summerhill (Holowesko Partners) narrowly avoided a serious setback when he crashed in the first lap at the Superprestige Asper-Gavere Sunday
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GAVERE, Belgium (VN) ─ Danny Summerhill (Holowesko Partners) narrowly avoided a serious setback when he crashed in the first lap at the Superprestige Asper-Gavere Sunday.
Summerhill, riding with the U.S. national team for a two-week block in Europe, landed hard on his left shoulder, which he dislocated two weeks ago in a warm-up crash in Boulder, Colorado.
“The intention of today – and I knew in the back of my head it could be sketchy – was to get a few good laps in training-wise. And if it got too sketchy and dangerous for the shoulder, I would pull it,” said Summerhill. “People were just going crazy to try and move up a spot.”
Summerhill was on one of the few flat sections of the technical Asper-Gavere course when he went airborne.
“The entire time I was in the air and rolling, all I could think about was, ‘Try not to bounce too much on it,’” he said.
Half an hour later, Summerhill had stretched his injured arm and was set to ride the 40-odd-kilometers to the USA Cycling team house in Izegem.
“It’s sore, but I don’t think I’ve done anything worse to it,” he said. “Whether that means it’s getting stronger or I was just lucky, I don’t know. I called it a day and decided to ride home to try and get some efforts in.”
The former world championship medalist was confident that he would start the November 27 Koksijde World Cup. Points for starting position at worlds are on the line in Koksijde and Summerhill has been aggressive in his return to racing prior to that event.