Joan Lascorz: "To everyone, thank you for all the messages of support"

Just a few minutes before the World Superbike Championship got underway at the Moscow Raceway for its grand season opener, we received a very special press release, with news about the condition of Joan Lascorz.

The Kawasaki rider remains admitted to the Guttmann Institute in Barcelona, where he is undergoing a process of recovery and adaptation to his new life. Although Joan is expected to leave the centre by mid-September, with a diagnosis of a C6 spinal cord injury, the statement specifies in particular that the rider

suffered a dislocation of the C6 vertebra, which caused a total severing of the spinal cord. According to the doctors, this injury is considered irreversible.

Therefore, Joan presents a tetraplegic condition; he has no movement in his legs, abdominal area or fingers, although he has sensation in his hands and movement in his face, neck, arms, shoulders, elbows and wrists. He has full mental faculties and is refocusing his life, closing the projects he had opened in the world of Superbikes, but with strength, motivation and the possibility of opening others, in the short term personal and in the medium term sporting.

Regarding the accident, the statement also mentions that the circumstances of it were as follows:

Joan had the accident during official practice sessions for the World Superbike Championship.

Joan’s fall was an accident that occurred while he was doing his job, pushing to the limit with a racing motorcycle, according to telemetry data, the opinion of the team’s engineers and Joan’s own sensations.

This is how Guim Roda, Team Manager of Kawasaki Racing Team, explains it:

Joan lost control of the bike entering a right-hand corner in 5th gear after a long straight with the front wheel slightly lifted off the ground. When it came back into contact with the asphalt at high speed just as he leaned the bike over, Joan lost control and ran off the track. He had just set a very good series of times and was about to lower the best lap of the day among all the riders on track.

The serious consequences of the fall and the injuries do not stem from the fall itself, but from the fact of hitting a wall close to the track at almost 200 km/h without any protection.

In this statement we were very, very happy to be able to read our Joan Lascorz, for the first time being part of his team’s statements, and below you can read literally what the 17 wanted to express to everyone.

Well… what happened to me is a real bummer. I don’t know if it’s bad luck or if the rules at Imola weren’t made for riding a 240 hp bike. Either way, it is without any doubt a full stop in my career as a motorcycle racer and a comma in my life. It is a very difficult situation and I’ll have to be brave to get through it. I want to thank the countless support I am receiving: from all motorcycle riders, both SBK and MotoGP, and from all categories past and present, from all the fans and professionals of motorcycling who have sent me messages of affection. To Albert Llovera, Filipo Presiosi, Oscar Lanza, Isidre Esteve and Pau Bach, whose visits and conversations have been invaluable to me; to the countless doctors and nurses of SBK, Maggiore Hospital in Bologna, ICU and the Spinal Cord Injury Unit at Vall d’Hebron and here at the Guttmann; in all these places they have treated me like a king! I also want to thank the Catalan and Spanish Motorcycling Federations and all the technical support I am receiving from the wheelchair brand Panthera, and above all, all my family: my father Juan, who is going through a terrible time, almost worse than me, my mother Maribel, my brothers and sisters, uncles, cousins, my friends and my teammates. All of them have been by my side at all times.

Once I leave the Guttmann, I will have to rethink my life in depth and look for financial resources for my situation, which is not easy at all. I will have to find new goals to keep enjoying life, although surely not with the same intensity as before.

At times I feel an enormous sadness at how quickly everything changed because of that wall, and I go over and over what happened, but at other times I feel full of optimism and think about what the future holds for me and everything new I still have to learn again. It had not been easy to reach the level I was at, and it was the result of a great deal of effort from everyone who made it possible for me to stop delivering pizzas at 18 on a 50cc scooter and start my professional career as a rider. It is a very sad injustice, but it will have to be faced in the best way possible. It is a type of injury that not only keeps you away from racing but marks you for life, and that is something I will always have to live with.

When my friends made the shield that has symbolised my recovery, they did not imagine for a moment the impact it would have or the support I have seen these months. It has given me enormous strength that people showed solidarity with my accident, and I want to thank them with all my heart. I was surprised to see Rossi, Dovizioso, Crutchlow, Hayden, Pedrosa, Yonny Hernández, Lorenzo… and surely many more in MotoGP, if not all of them, Márquez, Espargaró, Rabat, Rins… in fact, I could almost name the whole grid, because I’m forgetting so many… Teams that have put it on the fairing, like Team Caixa Catalunya Repsol from Alzamora or Team Pons, which still has it on, and many others I’m surely forgetting. I know more than 10,000 stickers have been made, and it is a great source of pride for me.

In SBK I think all the riders are wearing it: Checa, Haslam, Smrz, Sykes, my replacement Loris Baz, Biaggi has it near the TV in the garage, Rea, Melandri, Salom, who has half his bike decorated. I know my team has it on the bike and in the garage, and even the factory has it on the front of the fairing. To Sofuoglu, Morais and the whole Kawasaki family and its riders in STK600 and 1000, and of course to all those STK riders I have also seen wearing it on TV, whether they knew me or not. Thanks to Fujiwara and Akira Yanagawa, who in Japan carry the shield at every race, as well as the Japanese Team Green, which has it on its bikes.

HondaSpain has it on its website, the Easyrace cup, many CEV friends, and there is even a shield almost a metre tall at the entrance to the Motorland Circuit. To Solo Moto for the initiative of giving away the shield, and to Motocard and Kawasaki for funding it. To all the media that have shown interest and reported my news despite my silence, to all the motorcycle gatherings where I’ve seen people sending me photos and encouragement, to everyone I’ve forgotten or haven’t seen, thank you all very much. And let no one think that if I don’t go to the invitations I receive it is out of discourtesy; it is because for now, and until I come to terms with myself and my situation, I prefer to live a relaxed and private life, without renouncing what Joan Lascorz was able to achieve in the world of motorcycling, of which I am very proud, for what I lived through and for the recognition of everyone. To everyone, thank you for all the messages of support.

And regarding his most immediate future, it will be the readjustment to his sensations after leaving the Guttmann, and he will analyse his long-term future. Without doubt, many projects and new activities that Joan will pursue to the fullest, with all his determination and strength, as always, in grand style, our 17. And now, after these months with information coming through his team, it has been decided that all information will be shared through his personal website www.joanlascorz.com, which will soon be completely redesigned, and you can keep sending your messages of support to Joan by email at info@joanlascorz.com

Final comment from the team:

The team would like to ask once again all the riders, teams and everyone involved in motorcycle racing to keep support for Joan’s shield alive until the end of the season. It has proved to be a great help for Joan’s spirits and hopes, and keeping his image as a rider alive is important to him and to everyone around him.

This allows him to keep thinking like a rider, with ambition and fighting spirit, because now more than ever it will be necessary.

Source | Kawasaki Racing Team