# WOW! Formerly paralyzed - now with Rabobank



## ChilliConCarnage (Jun 1, 2006)

Un-paralyzed cyclist training for Olympics | The Sideshow - Yahoo! News

*Un-paralyzed* cyclist training for Olympics now training with Rabobank team

Paralympic silver medalist Monique van der Vorst has experienced a truly amazing and unexplained recovery from her injuries and is now considered a hopeful for the 2016 Rio Olympics.

The 27-year-old Van der Vorst had been paralyzed from the waist down since she was 13. But in a strange twist, she was hit by a bicycle last year during training for the 2012 London Paralympics. Somehow, the injury appears to have reversed her paralysis.

"I wanted to jump in the air for joy," van der Vorst said. And now, she literally can.

The two-time Paralympic medal winning handcyclist has begun training with the Rabobank women's professional cycling team as a "top-class able-bodied athlete."


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## OldEndicottHiway (Jul 16, 2007)

ChilliConCarnage said:


> Un-paralyzed cyclist training for Olympics | The Sideshow - Yahoo! News
> 
> *Un-paralyzed* cyclist training for Olympics now training with Rabobank team
> 
> ...



Saw this on the news feeds today. 

Logged in to RBR tonight thinking it would be all over the place here, but am surprised to find it's barely a blip (edit to add: perhaps it's "old news"...I just haven't been keeping up on the cycling world lately).


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## Marc (Jan 23, 2005)

WOW doesn't begin to cover it.


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## waldo425 (Sep 22, 2008)

What an amazing story. Such a freak accidental recovery too. Just amazing.


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## stoked (Aug 6, 2004)

I heard her interview last week on NPR. Amazing.


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## Ventruck (Mar 9, 2009)

That's ****ing nuts. No clue to exactly how she's doing on the bike though, is there? I mean you take someone who could'nt use their legs for 14 years training with Rabobank...I wouldn't think the team will slow down for her. My word.


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## Blue 58 (Aug 6, 2008)

If you believe this, I have a bridge to sell you...


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## waldo425 (Sep 22, 2008)

Ventruck said:


> That's ****ing nuts. No clue to exactly how she's doing on the bike though, is there? I mean you take someone who could'nt use their legs for 14 years training with Rabobank...I wouldn't think the team will slow down for her. My word.


I think that this just happened. I would assume that if she has the genetics to do well enough to get a silver (twice) at the Paralympics, then she has the ability to do well on a road bike too.


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## waldo425 (Sep 22, 2008)

Blue 58 said:


> If you believe this, I have a bridge to sell you...


You can't fake it when get to that level. I don't know what you had in mind; but you can't just hop into a wheelchair and expect that no one is going to check when you go to the Paralympics.


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## Dwayne Barry (Feb 16, 2003)

Blue 58 said:


> If you believe this, I have a bridge to sell you...


Would be quite amazing if we're talking going from complete loss of motor function to good enough recruitment to cycle or jump, etc.

Or are we talking about somebody with partial paralysis who has regained enough control to perform some tasks they couldn't do before, including cycling (which is about as simple a motor task as there is)?

Any one know details, this is the kind of stuff that should be showing up in top class medical journals if true?

Edit: Well with a little searching I found this:

"Van der Vorst says she initially lost feeling in her legs after suffering nerve damage from an ankle operation when she was 13. That problem was compounded by a later car accident in which her spine was injured."

You never know what is lost in translation to a journalist but how do you lose sensation to your legs from an ankle surgery (sure you could have a nerve injury during surgery and lose sensation from that point down but your "legs" as a whole)? Compounded by a car accident later, are there studies of her damaged spine?

If I had to speculate I'd say something psychological is going on here which certainly makes the story much more believable.


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## Alaska Mike (Sep 28, 2008)

As I found out a few years ago, it doesn't take much to screw up a neural pathway. In my case it was a slightly bulged disk that left me with shooting pains in my left arm (like someone twisting a knife in my elbow). I lost all strength in that arm, and it was only because of a hospital stay caused by all of the pain medications (prescribed/taken like candy) shutting down my digestive system that it sorted itself out. I think it was the extended bed rest and morphine drip that did it. Not a pleasant experience.

Now, I can see the same sort of problem shutting down someone's legs. My question is what sort of atrophy would have occurred in that time, and how they rehabbed the legs to get to this point? With women's cycling hanging by a thread, I can't see a team spending that kind of money on a publicity stunt. She has to has at least domestique ability on the bike.


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## Dwayne Barry (Feb 16, 2003)

Alaska Mike said:


> As I found out a few years ago, it doesn't take much to screw up a neural pathway. In my case it was a slightly bulged disk that left me with shooting pains in my left arm (like someone twisting a knife in my elbow). I lost all strength in that arm, and it was only because of a hospital stay caused by all of the pain medications (prescribed/taken like candy) shutting down my digestive system that it sorted itself out. I think it was the extended bed rest and morphine drip that did it. Not a pleasant experience.
> 
> Now, I can see the same sort of problem shutting down someone's legs. My question is what sort of atrophy would have occurred in that time, and how they rehabbed the legs to get to this point? With women's cycling hanging by a thread, I can't see a team spending that kind of money on a publicity stunt. She has to has at least domestique ability on the bike.


Well her muscles should have been nearly completely deconditioned (it would be interesting to know if she had spasms & increased tone as is fairly typical for the paralyzed muscles of someone with a SCI vs. a flaccid paralysis) but that is reversible with training.

The more I think about this the more I'm convinced this is psychological. If you had a true SCI resulting in paralysis and loss of sensation it makes no sense that some trauma would suddenly reverse it. There should be a section of "dead" spinal cord and to reverse it you'd have to have nerve regeneration across the injury (and this takes time, far longer than a stay in the hospital) and then you have the problem of the "wires" on one side connecting up with the correct "wires" on the other side so that you get normal sensation, pain, motor control, etc.

She's running and roller skating based on pictures so her motor control must be fairly if not perfectly normal, just doesn't make sense that this was a SCI that somehow fixed itself.


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## Dwayne Barry (Feb 16, 2003)

Alaska Mike said:


> Now, I can see the same sort of problem shutting down someone's legs.


Except of course your description is typical of compressed nerves but absolutely unlike the descriptions of her condition which is more typical of a SCI when nerves are acutely severed or destroyed even if both can end-up with paralysis.


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## Dwayne Barry (Feb 16, 2003)

stoked said:


> I heard her interview last week on NPR. Amazing.


Do you know which show it was on?

I'd like to hear it if I can find it.


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## Creakyknees (Sep 21, 2003)

Alaska Mike said:


> I can't see a team spending that kind of money on a publicity stunt.


um, for what other reason besides publicity do pro teams exist?


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## Alaska Mike (Sep 28, 2008)

Results. Losing teams usually don't get many sponsors. Gimmick stories don't usually have staying power.

A "compelling story" like Evie Stevens that actually gets results is another thing entirely.


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## Creakyknees (Sep 21, 2003)

Alaska Mike said:


> Results. Losing teams usually don't get many sponsors. Gimmick stories don't usually have staying power.
> 
> A "compelling story" like Evie Stevens that actually gets results is another thing entirely.


No.

Teams want to get results, true. They want results, in order to get more publicity for their sponsors.

This "gimmick story" already has had more staying power in this forum than any other female racer topic that I can recall. In fact, can you even recall a (non-podium girls) female racer thread at all?

And, how much non-cycling press coverage do you suppose this story has received? Would you estimate it to be more, or less non-cycling press coverage than the last time a US lady won a world championship?


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## Alaska Mike (Sep 28, 2008)

...but we're not talking about a US-registered/sponsored team. We're talking about Rabobank. If all that mattered was gimmicks and publicity stunts, they would fill the team with them. While her story likely affected their decision to a slight degree, her capabilities probably played a larger role. Somehow I think the Dutch are a little better clued-in to cycling, even women's cycling, than the US is.

We'll see how much she contributes over the season.


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## Blue 58 (Aug 6, 2008)

Somatoform disorder


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## iheartbenben (Mar 18, 2011)

Creakyknees said:


> In fact, can you even recall a (non-podium girls) female racer thread at all?


I can recall their bust lines.


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## Keski (Sep 25, 2004)

Interview with CBC Canada. Not sure if it works outside of Canada...

Audio


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## Jwiffle (Mar 18, 2005)

For those discounting the possibility that she has recovered from a paralysis to a high level of cycling, it should be noted that the paralysis left her more than a year ago. She started walking again in 2010. So the atrophied muscles have had some time to strengthen. Enough to race a bicycle competitively at this point? Probably not. But her goal is the 2016 Olympics - another 4 YEARS away. So I doubt the Rabobank team expects her to really have much results this year, but having seen her general physical abilities in the paralympics, I can see them taking a gamble on her being able to be a substantial help to the team in a year or so.

As for the accident jarring things into working again - I've heard stranger cases. Saw a tv article about a man who was blinded in some accident, but doctors couldn't really explain WHY he was blind - everything appeared normal. Several years later, while making his way down the stairs at work, he had a severe and sudden headache that lasted just a minute or two, and when he opened his eyes, he could see again. Saw a story another time about a man who woke up from a coma after 19 years. Doctors figured he'd never wake up.

Anyway, best of luck to Van der Vorst


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