Help for Ana Orenz after a Horrific Cycling Crash

Support for Ana Orenz after a Horrific Cycling Crash.

 

 

 

Our friend Ana Orenz sustained a terrible crash on Saturday night while participating in the 3500km Trans Iberica Ultra Cycling event. Descending a hill at full speed she collided with several wild boar and was knocked unconscious, having suffered a huge head trauma.

 

We know that Ana lay for two hours on the road before she was found. For the first hour she was unconscious but then she awoke unable to move or call out for help. Finally she was found by two race participants and was transferred to Pamplona hospital where she is now being treated.

 

The report from the first-responders is that Ana is incredibly lucky to have survived. She has broken her neck but thankfully her spinal cord, although severely bruised, is not severed; in the days since the accident she has regained close-to-full arm movement and some leg movement but the traumatologist believes that it will be up to a year before Ana is able to stand by herself.

 

Ana has suffered little or no brain damage but sadly she has serious facial trauma that will require many months of surgical reconstruction.

 

For those of you who don’t know Ana, not only is she a committed, proud and loving single mother to Ruby she is also a formidable ultra endurance cyclist. Relatively new to the sport, she has been the first female finisher in virtually every race she has entered - most recently she won the 24 hour Cyclo Circuit Valencia and set the record for the first woman to triple Everest.

 

I list those wins purely because I want you to know how committed she is to this sport, how much she has sacrificed and what strength she has to push on through hardship.

 

 

 

 

In the world of unsupported racing, Ana is as unsupported as they come; often working several jobs for six days a week, to provide for herself, her daughter and to pursue her love for cycling.

 

 

 

 

Of course we dream that Ana will ride again, that she will win another race, but our reality today is that Ana’s goals are to sit up, to walk, to go home and to relearn the basics of life that we take for granted. She faces many months off work and the donations we ask for will go towards her physical therapy and allowing her time to rest and recuperate, to be looked after for once. We will provide a full breakdown of costings once we have them from the different palliative teams.

 

Thank you.

 

P.S. for those of you that wish to follow her recuperation, her daughter Ruby will be posting updates on Ana’s instagram at https://www.instagram.com/moremiles_moresmiles_/