Skateboarding big air silver medalist went into the quarterpipe
off balance and knew he was in trouble when he shot away from
the wall.
Jake Brown was groggy from all the medication, but he knew
where he hurt.
"My wrist is pretty sore and my back and neck feel like I've been
through a car accident," he said this morning during a phone
interview. "I guess I've got a fracture in one of my vertebras but
it's pretty minor supposedly, so I came out alright."
Brown, 32, is fortunate to be alive after crash landing from more
than 45 feet during Thursday night's skateboarding big air
competition.
He also sustained contusions of the liver and lung, and a mild
concussion. The liver injury is what's keeping him under watch at
California Hospital Medical Center in downtown Los Angeles.
"I'm going to check out today," said the Carlsbad athlete, whose
wrist injury is a small bone fracture. "I'm just waiting on an X-
ray, and they want to make sure my liver's not still bleeding. I
just want to get out of here, dude."
Brown, who finished second to Bob Burnquist based on a high-scoring previous
run, said he has watched his ill-fated attempt to perform a 720-degree spin
across the 70 foot gap and a 540 above the 27-foot-tall quarterpipe wall.
He nailed the 720, a first during a competition, but was too far to the left as he
approached the quarterpipe at 40-plus mph.
"I was too far to the left of the ramp so I started carving across toward the right
and I tried to straighten up when I was going up the transition," he said. "And I
started sliding a little bit and the only way to get out of that was to compress, and
once I compressed I just shot myself out to the flat."
Brown, who was about 19 feet above the quarterpipe, said he was in "pure
survival mode" as he fell toward the flat part of the ramp, and in mid-air he
recalled that a similar thing happened to Pat Duffy, last December on Burnquist's
backyard mega-ramp.
"I already knew my friend Pat Duffy had been in the same situation, and he didn't
come out so hot -- he broke his legs," Brown said.
Duffy, who did not fall nearly as far as Brown, required extensive surgery --
including the use of screws and a plate -- to repair a broken leg.
"I was just trying to work out how the best way to fall would be," added Brown,
who at the last instant, as he was flailing, turned and feet and back end first.
Eight minutes later he was helped to his feet, raising an arm for the crowd, and
escorted to a wheelchair in the hallway.
Asked why he did not ask for a stretcher, he replied, "I knew what happened and
I just wanted to test my body and see how wrecked I was, you know?"
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