The U.S. Open Miami & an Injury Update
Miami, FL | Washington, DC - January & February 2022
On the second to last day of the January Camp, we ran into some injury trouble. We ended the session with a couple of windward mark bareaways and pitchpoled on the last rounding. On this particular capsize, I swung forward and landed close to the front of the boat. Reed jumped forward to do the same, but his left foot stayed behind, stuck in the footstrap. Reed’s momentum was stopped by his ankle and he broke his 5th metatarsal on impact. Coach Mark was close by in the coach boat and quickly helped Reed get his foot out from the strap and get him into the coach boat. This left me to outrun a squall single-handed with an injured Reed and an animated British coach telling me to hurry up.
Reed spent the next month recovering - this involved a lot of resting, icing, compressing, and elevating. After meeting with specialists, it was clear Reed would have to take 8-10 weeks off to heal. We quickly reached out to Ian Moran, a good friend and 49er driver, to step in for Reed for a few weeks.
Ian and I finished the rest of the U.S. training block and competed in the U.S. Open Miami regatta at the end of January. The regatta provided a competitive 10 boat fleet with one day of light air and the second day of solid 15 knots. We had several strong races, and successfully executed several tough maneuvers despite limited practice together, including a very aggressive pin end start which resulted in us getting stuck on the mark at go.
Ian and I spent the last week of January training with the Canadian team, who would be training out of the U.S. Sailing Center until mid-February. After several days of good training, I ran into some injury trouble of my own.
I had long-standing trouble with a hernia in my lower groin which hadn't actively caused any issue. Towards the end of January that changed, and I spent the evening of the 24th in the ER after tearing a second hernia on the other side of my groin. Surgery seemed the only route to ensure something like this wouldn't happen again, and I quickly booked an appointment back home in D.C.
I completed a successful surgery on February 15th with a six-week recovery to look forward to. Reed is now a few weeks into a strong PT regimen and will have a similar road back to full strength. After recovery, we plan to continue training in Miami with Mark and several U.S. teammates. We are disappointed to miss out on a month of training and are itching to get back on the water. It’s hard to imagine better timing, however, with both of us scheduled to return to action on nearly the exact same day. In the meantime, we’ll be reading books on how to become successful gentlemen and otherwise educating and bettering ourselves. A week into recovery and already the madness is setting in.
