“You spend months preparing, training and [doing] lots of riding for racing and never even tip over really,” wrote Ken Roczen on Instagram. The German has dropped countless titbits of information on the social-media platform since his horrific crash at Anaheim 2, but felt the need to recap the mountains that he has overcome since then.

“Literally go without crashing for weeks and everything washes down the drain from just one little bitty mishap,” he continued. “To be honest, I don’t see anything I did wrong. Not like the previous years where I go, ‘Man that was stupid.’ But riding/racing you have to act quick… very! In the end you can’t pause the world and think about what you are going to do for a second.

“You will always go with your instinct and there is nothing wrong with that. That’s part of learning and getting better. But, like I said, I would love to look at the crash and say, ‘Oh that’s what happened!’ But I can’t. Not sure if that makes it easier or harder. Anyway, I felt more gathered and collected and focused than ever as you could tell in my riding (in my eyes) and then something this scary happens so quick.

“I got VERY lucky that I really just demolished my arm because, at that speed and height, it could have been very ugly. It was still scary coming out of the first surgery when Doc Viola said if it hadn’t have been done now I could have lost my arm. I started having compartment syndrome, which means my muscles and everything were so swollen from the impact that they stopped getting blood flow and slowly stopped working, and once the muscle is dead there is no bringing it back. Anyway, tough pill to swallow but, hey, could have been worse. Felt like telling the story, but it’s good to hear that things are gonna [sic] be fine. Just gotta [sic] be patient,” he concluded.

It’s an intriguing look into not only the physical damage, but the mental hurdles that one must overcome. It now seems quite unlikely that he’ll make it back for the Lucas Oil Pro Motocross opener, like most had hoped, although things are heading in a positive direction. Roczen has now left hospital and is en route to his home, but more work is on the horizon.