It’s a sad day for Austin Forkner who has announced his retirement from a sport that, once again, showed how brutal it can be even to some of the elite talents of the sport.
Forkmer burst onto the scene with speed and confidence as a teenager, he looked like America’s next big thing, outshining the likes of Chase Sexton. If anything, it was Forkner who would have been pegged to have the sort of career Chase Sexton has ended up having with major titles at the elite end of the sport.
Forkner had no fear and no limits but, eventually the injuries after several crashes became too much to overcome. Some of the crashes were freak occurrances, the crash off the start line that ruined his knee when he was just back from injury, the mid-air collision with Jett Lawrence that left Forkner with a broken collarbone.
Of course, there was that scary crash that saw him launch off the track while leading and smack his head off the concrete floor that ultimately saved his life when he had brain surgery.
From there, Forkner never could get that blazing speed back but he did build himself back to.a top five guy outdoors and was hovering around the top ten in his early 450 races this year until more crashes and injuries took him out again.
Even outdoors this year, Forkner seemed to be coming from the back every moto, it summed up thr last from years of his career, coming from the back trying to get it back,ultimately it was just too much to overcome.
But Austin will always have to wonder what could have been because not many riders are born with speed he burst onto the scene with.
Motocross is brutal.
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