Rhodes suffers cruel injury blow

Experienced NZ Ironman competitor Bryan Rhodes has suffered a freakish and crippling injury while racing in America over the weekend, one that will rule the Taupo athlete out of action for the best part of a year.

Rhodes has ruptured his Achilles tendon in the swim leg of the Steelhead Ironman 70.3 race.

“I was feeling good in the morning and was injury free,” said Rhodes. “All the male pro’s lined up for the 7am start. Unfortunately when running into the swim another athlete either stood on or grabbed my heel with their hand as I was accelerating. I felt my Achilles tendon snap and it sort of felt like cramp. The pain was intense so I rolled onto my back for a minute or so to recover. I did not think it was anything too major so I started to swim dragging my leg behind me.

“I completed the swim and ended up in about 4th position but when I went to stand up I suddenly realized the extent of my injury. I was unable to place any weight on my leg and it was extremely painful. I yelled out for help and several volunteers came to my rescue carrying me into the shore and to the medical tent in a wheel chair. The medical team knew that it was extremely bad so I ended up in the ambulance to the hospital. The impact on my heel had caused my Achilles tendon to rupture.”

Rhodes has already come to terms with the only course of action if he is to recover sufficiently well to race again, he will go under the knife to repair the damage on return home.

“The only option for recovery is surgery. I will be heading back to New Zealand in the next few days for surgery and then physiotherapy. Hopefully everything will go smoothly and my Achilles tendon will mend quickly, so I will be back to fitness and racing again sometime in the near future.

“Unfortunately this injury means I will be unable to defend my title in Ironman Canada and compete at Ironman World Championships in Hawaii this year. Mentally this will be hard for me being unable to reach my goals this season but hopefully I will be back to 100% fitness as soon as possible. In my 20 years of triathlon racing this is the worst injury I have ever had and hopefully I will be able to bounce back stronger.”