Biker's broken bones

Evening Chronicle (Newcastle, England), March 28, 2006

Byline: By John Gibson

Injuries are the bane of every speedway rider who hurtles down a track and into a tight bend two abreast with no brakes and only a steel cap on a boot to help survival.

From a very early age, George Stancl became acquainted with a hospital bed and the flashing blue lights of an ambulance at full pelt.

"I wasn't allowed to start speedway until I was 16 because a 15-year-old kid had been killed and the age limit was therefore increased," explained George.

"But once I was the right age no one was going to stop me. Fear is something you must never have ( if you do, don't get on a speedway bike. You have to be mad.

"At 16 I was racing but I couldn't drive the van which transported my bikes. You had to be 18 for a driving licence.

"I always remember in those early days the hospital was next to the track and it was hard when I was lying there.

"I could hear the noise of the pits and the crowd and I felt I should be there, not lying in bed."

It would take too long to list Stancl's injuries. Suffice to say that most bones have been broken more than once.

His mother, who feared for her husband, has watched her son be carried out of a stadium in a coma and whisked off to hospital, blues lights blazing.

"That sort of thing must be awful for any mother," admitted George.

Should you wonder about the mad bit then consider this: in 2000 Stancl broke his back riding for Coventry but returned to racing within two months. Crazy!

However, he crashed again shortly afterwards and was instructed by his doctors not to ride again that year.

"Oh, It was painful when I broke my back because there was no operation to put things right," he admitted.

"I just had to wait until the bones healed. I think they were relieved to discharge me from hospital because I had so many visitors it was like a football match."