 |
| image: Redbull.com |
I've played this video for my three Outdoor Adventure diploma program classes I teach this semester. These guide-training students, who are all trained with 80 hour Wilderness First Responder, have all said the same thing:
Why did they let the guy get up?
Most competitive sports have referees and coaches - most of our adventure and action sports do not (thankfully, in some cases). It is the ref's role to enforce the rules but also to ensure the players are fit to compete. Boxing ref's can call off a match if one competitor seems compromised. Coaches are now highly trained to recognize concussions in soccer, hockey, football (and just about every other sport) and are mandated to pull an athlete in doubt.
If a dude falls 60 feet off a cliff, do you think his or her health may be compromised? That the EMT's on site let him get up is ridiculous. That the athlete walked away uninjured is surprising, which makes him the hero in this clip (note the inspirational music and heroic references). Imagine he had an unstable spinal injury (highly likely), gets up due to adrenaline and competitive spirit, and promptly crumples with a debilitating or fatal spinal chord injury. Not heroic.
A personal anecdote: I race BMX with my kids - me in the old guys class, obviously. At the provincial finals this year I was T-boned in the first moto/race. The guy who hit me and myself went flying. I landed unscathed but he lay in a heap, clearly unconscious. He was out for 2 minutes. I jumped to his head to perform spinal control while the EMT's assessed him. When he came to, he was cleared for spinal and assisted off the track. I was more than a little surprised to see him lined up for the next moto 30 minutes later. He was visibly, but not totally, out of it. He should have been pulled from the race by the EMT's and given a DNF, whether he thought he was good to go or not. It turns out this guy, Mr. T-bone, struggled with several months of severe concussion symptoms after this day. I suspect these could have been dramatically reduced if he had sat out the rest of the day.
Same for Nicholi Ragotkin. Falling off a 60 foot cliff puts you in no position to decide that you can finish your run. The EMT's - and the event organizers - should be mandated to pull anyone who has clearly been compromised. Like it or not, event organizers have a duty to look after those that compete in their events. Just because they walk away does not mean anything.
So here is to a Medical-DNF category. Our adventure and action sports, while based on assumption of risk, need boundaries when it comes to competition. The athlete is NOT in the best position to decide this. Want to ride off a cliff on your own time? Go for it. But in competition the organizers need to direct their EMT's and officials to pull those at risk. That this dude got lucky is not the precedent to follow.