“Don’t know what’s coming next”: the American ski racer fears for his career

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It is the very dark side of the sport that American Samuel DuPratt (30) is confronted with again. The speed specialist from Salt Lake City broke both legs, fought his way from the wheelchair back onto the race track in a year and a half and finally got his hands on the World Cup air again after three years. And then it happened: DuPratt tore his ACL shortly before New Year’s Eve. Now that he has spoken out, the great disappointment is evident in his words.

«I left my cruciate ligament in Bormio. That’s hard to swallow,” DuPratt wrote on Instagram. “But this is the life I chose and I would do it exactly the same again.” The ski racer fears for his career: “I don’t know what will happen. Now is the chance to see how much perseverance I have, or the chance to move on with the rest of my life.”

A few days after a long-awaited comeback

Initially, DuPratt was happy with his return to the World Cup. The time would have come at the end of November in Beaver Creek in his home country, but the races were canceled. For example, DuPratt faced anxiety in Val Gardena, where he broke both legs during a training run in 2020. He conquered the Saslong, was 58th in the first descent, 52nd in the Super-G and did not finish in the same place in the second descent. But Bormio was able to arrive shortly before New Year’s Eve.

The accident then happened on the Stelvio: during the Bormio descent with surprising winner Cyprien Sarrazin (Fr) ahead of Marco Odermatt, DuPratt tore his cruciate ligament. It is the race where Austrian star Marco Schwarz was taken away by helicopter and also suffered a torn cruciate ligament. And it is the race after which American ski racer Samuel DuPratt finds himself once again at a crossroads in his career.

Source : Blick