So, at the end of the last instalment I left you in casualty. Actually that’s not totally true – in fact you left me in casualty. Which was a bit callous, actually.

Having come to the conclusion that I’d be better off at home than in Leicester, and having enjoyed the attentions of the lovely ladies in the plaster room, it now came time to work out just how to get home. The first part was easy – phone a taxi to take me back to the circuit. Mates there had contacted Ade who had popped the trailer on the back of his car and bumbled up to the circuit, so when I rolled up my bike was already loaded and strapped on. The boot of his car was full of the bits that should really have been attached to the bike and we were ready to roll. Ade had an early start the next day so we agreed to leave the wreckage at Clare’s house while she gave me a lift to a halfway point at which my wife could collect me and bring me home. The journey was hell. By this stage I was starting, in hindsight, to go into shock. I was feeling sick and shakey and was incredibly emotional. Seeing the state of the bike made me feel worse and the fact that everyone was going to so much trouble to help was the icing on the cake.

I got home at about 10.00. Roundabouts and speedbumps were really not a huge amount of fun as, up until this point, I’d had no painkillers whatsoever. No appetite but managed to eat something because I knew I ought to. A quick phone call to Princess Royal University Hospital at Farnborough, Kent, confirmed that I would be best off coming in first thing in the morning and then I retired to bed.

Surprisingly I slept like the dead.

At an ungodly hour the next day, my long suffering wife delivered me to A&E at Farnborough with my x-rays and a referral note. We then had lots more x-rays and examinations before it was agreed that yes, I had indeed broken my elbow and would need surgery. No problem and not much of a surprise.

What was a surprise was the speed and efficiency that this stage of things got dealt with. I was in bed, on a ward and subject to the full attention of the NHS within a couple of hours. By early afternoon I’d been seen by the registrar and understood roughly what was going to happen and when. The game plan was to operate late on Friday, but the best laid plans are sometimes subject to, in this case, patients not being as straightforward to mend as might be expected. So I got bumped onto Saturday’s list.

Now this might be a good time to put a few things straight about the NHS. I can’t speak for everywhere, of course, but Farnborough (and Leicester) were both fantastically clean, staffed by cheerful and friendly people and places where, if I really had to be ill, I’d be quite happy to be. The ward in Farnborough was great, the food was good and the people who I was dealing with were brilliant. I spent my first night in hospital hungry but as comfortable as I could reasonably expect and confident that I was in safe hands.

Saturday morning, bright and early, I had a very pleasant surprise. I had a visit from Andrea, a very attractive and pleasant young lady who turned out to be the anaesthetist. She’s also a biker so we chatted about track days, bikes and falling off. Or not – by far the better solution. She also put me in the picture about my upcoming enforced nap and generally reassured me. Or would have done, had I needed it. I also got a visit from the surgeon, who was nowhere near as attractive but proved equally reassuring.

So mid morning I get wheeled off downstairs to be repaired. I’ve phoned home, they know what’s happening, all is fine and we’re expecting to see each other in a couple of hours, allowing for recovery time and so on. Easy.

Obviously, exactly what happened after Andrea smiled at me and said goodnight is going to be a little second hand, what with me being asleep and all, but as I understand it things started to go a little pear shaped rather shortly after this. You see, I'm not a stranger to the ways of reconstructive orthopeadic surgery. And sadly my right elbow had already been the recipient of some professional attention. The net result of which was that things weren't entirely where God intended them to be when the surgeon started to rummage around.

The long and the short of it is that rather than an hour or so, I was in surgery for something over five hours. Face down, apparently. Now as I said I was asleep so it didn't bother me that much. Caused a bit of consternation with those who were expecting to see me before lunch though.

Returning to the land of the living, the first thing I noticed was that I was on oxygen. Which is a bit of a unpleasant surprise I can tell you. The next was that I didn't hurt and that everyone seemed happy to see me. I'm assured, though I have no evidence, that I looked rather like I'd done a few rounds with Mike Tyson as well - face swollen and bruised looking from being face down that long. Anyway, at this stage I had two plastic tubes coming out of my arm to allow everything to drain and the backslab that had been supplied in Leicester was still there to stop me clobbering anything. I felt surprisingly good , all things considered. I even got something to eat, which may have been a challenge but made me feel better.

Saturday night, however, was a different story. I'm not a great fan of painkillers so as a rule I try to use the minimum I can. Nothing wrong with that, but this time I maxed out on the oral painkillers they had for me. By about ten at night I'd asked for something stronger and had a shot of morphine. Which also didn't do anything. I spent Saturday night crying quietly to myself while regularly having to get up and pee. Restful it was not.

But Sunday was a new day. After a brief doze I woke up to sunshine, far less pain and what passes for a hearty breakfast in hospital. From there on it was easy going, and I was allowed to go home on Tuesday. No plaster cast, no drain tubes and already with a little movement. But I felt like crap.

Wednesday I had an appointment to see the surgeon. Who, um, doesn't like bikers very much. Now I really, really appreciate his efforts but I think he pushed my gratitude rather too far when he started telling me that I had to stop riding. He also threw a complete wobbly about the fact that I wasn't in plaster, wasn't intending to take a month off work and wasn't generally being an invalid. So I went in feeling great and came out with a cast again, albeit a removable one, and a severely bent ear.

I went back to work on the Thursday, a week to the day after the accident. I have never been so tired in my life, grabbed so many catnaps or lost so much weight so fast. A kilo a week while doing no exercise at all and eating like a horse. Healing is hard work.

Now it's four months down the line. My physio, a rather robust chap called Russ who works in Beckenham, was brilliant and bullied, cajoled and encouraged me into making a just about full recovery. I've lost a few degrees of movement in that I can't fully straighten my arm, but it's still improving. I can play squash, carry things and generally act like nothing has happened. I'm still not properly fit to ride a sportsbike though, mainly because of the weight I need to put through it all the time, and I reckon it'll be a while before I get back on the track.

A couple of weeks after the crash, I went for a run. Tripping over the kerb I managed to avoid falling on my elbow but did land on my left wrist. Which really hurt. A quick trip back to casualty showed that I had a lovely scar on the scaphoid bone in my wrist. Yes, I'd broken it and hadn't realised - it's notoriously difficult to spot at the time anyway - so a brief argument resulted in my not being plastered but getting a rigid support to wear for a few weeks. That's no problem now either.

In short, then, I've been incredibly lucky. I had a big crash that could have been really bad but wasn't. Then I got some of the best medical care I could ever have asked for. I've got a big but fairly tidy scar and virtually no permanent problems. But it's not an experience I really want to repeat. Nor is it one I can recommend you to try.

Special thanks to:

Arai Helmets
Dainese Leathers
Racer Gloves
Sidi Boots

Mallory Park medical centre
Leicester Royal Infirmary
Princess Royal University Hospital, Orpington

Next time we'll look at what happened to the kit...