When racing goes bad
It’d been a good season for Peter Boast but in the space of a week it all went very wrong for both him and his protégé Franco Bourne…
Iwasn’t at Thruxton for the BSB meeting. I was at home, preparing bikes for the Manx Grand Prix on the Isle of Man, so I watched Franco’s Junior Superstock race on telly. At the previous round at Brand Hatch he’d finished a measured third and we all thought he’d get a decent result at Thruxton; it’s a fast track that should suit him and the Kawasaki. He qualified 5th, was 6th at the end of the first lap, then he got his head down, broke the lap record and was up to second behind Max Cook. Then he crashed. From where I was, watching on telly, it looked like a nothing of a crash. He was in the first chicane and the front tucked under him on the left hander. He was up and walking, with no sign of injury so I thought he was alright. I was on the phone with him half an hour later, by which time he was in the medical centre. But I still didn’t think much of it, he’d broken a little finger. I was surprised when he called me a day later and says that he’s got to have an operation on it, but if you don’t get these things sorted properly they’ll never be right. I’m carrying enough old injuries to know that. If it was near the end of the season and he was leading the championship I’m sure he’d have taken some pain killers and raced with it, but it’s not, so he needs to get it right.
That means he’s missed Cadwell Park and Snetterton, but with a bit of luck he’ll be back for the Oulton Park round on 24-25 September and I’m sure he’ll be right back on it.
I went the Island the following Thursday, but it was Sunday before my first lap. I got asked to lead some newcomers round, so I went out for a steady lap on my Yamaha MT-07. I did one lap and thought the suspension was too stiff so I wasn’t ready to push on, so for my second lap I went on the 250.
I went out with James Hind and we were steady away, building up speed. When you get through Braddan (a couple of miles after the start) you get your head down begin to push on. I got to the left kink before Union Mills, which is flat in fourth, so about 130mph, and suddenly, boom, without any warning I’m sliding down the road, getting beaten up and really scared. I didn’t know what the hell had happened.
Somehow I managed to crawl to the righthand side of the road, but I knew I was in big trouble. I couldn’t breathe. I’d no idea or care where the bike was, but someone later said that it looked like a bomb had gone off, and the bike came back in two big bits, with debris everywhere. I was in hospital soon enough, but even then I was still really scared. I was conscious throughout. I’ve broken 12 vertebrae, seven ribs, a scaphoid and punctured a lung, but that doesn’t really cover the emotional trauma of it. You’re lying there thinking; ‘Shit, I hope I’m going to be OK’, but you’re also having regrets about things in the lead up to it, and ‘if only this or if only that’, and why me? The bike had seized, so it wasn’t like I’d made a mistake. And then, once you know you are in the safe zone your brain switches to ‘gotta get better’ because there’s a lot still left to do in life. On the Isle of Man they said I’d be OK, even though the top vertebrae were still a bit fragile. But there’s a lot to do before I feel like I’ll be alright. I’ve got a head and back brace on, hand in a pot, I can walk about but I get out of breath because of the lung damage. Getting comfy with broken ribs is hard – I’ve been sleeping in a chair – and going to the loo is an issue, but we don’t talk about that.
I’m hoping I’ll be back on a trials bike by Christmas, but that’s me finished with road racing. That was a very close call, I know that, but there are other things that have gone wrong this year that weren’t my fault. I’ve been riding alright, but stuff going wrong – especially on the old bikes – I don’t need that, not at my age. Time to concentrate on helping the youngsters. I’m planning on being at Oulton, helping Franco, before you read this.
‘Suddenly, boom, without any warning I’m sliding down the road, getting beaten up and really scared’