American Racer "Heartbroken" After Season Ending Injury
Professional downhill ski racer Erik Arvidsson suffered every skier's worst nightmare: tearing your ACL.
In a somber post to IG 2 days ago, Erik wrote, "I'm gonna ******* miss these dudes this year. Heartbroken to have torn my ACL and LCL on the last training day before the start of the World Cup season."
The Instagram slideshow shows the actual ACL-tearing event, which is pretty gnarly to watch. Erik even made the disclaimer, "Don’t scroll to the right if you don’t want to watch someone toss an ACL..."
The video shows Erik whipping down a GS course, full speed, only to catch an edge, eject from one ski, and slide on his back down the slope, probably in massive amounts of pain.
Erik thanked the team behind him as he braves these difficult times.
"Thanks so much to all the @usskiteam doctors, physios, coaches, athletes, and support staff who have helped me start to get things organized for the long road back. As @akilde told me yesterday I am not the first and I won’t be the last. I’ll be back soon."
Park or big mountain are often seen as the most dangerous side of skiing, since the odds of getting injured are higher when you're trying new tricks and hucking your body off cliffs.
But racing can be dicey, too: when you're going at high speeds down an already-tracked-up and rutted-out course, injuries can and do occur.
Around 20,000 skiers suffer from ACL injuries every season. To reduce your risk, The Institute for Arthroscopy and Sports Medicine advises doing thigh and hip exercises to strengthen the muscles to take the strain off your ligaments, to do core exercises to improve stability, and build up your muscle tone in general.
Basically, train on and off the mountain to make sure you are using safe form and your muscles are prepared for the stress of skiing.
Erik is in good hands, and we're keeping our fingers crossed for Erik's fast return.
Related: Delilah Cupp Shares Raw Emotions After Tearing 2nd ACL In One Year
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