Michael Bryne’s leg was really bad. This is what we learned watching him last season in the outdoors. The Aussie rider’s crash while leading Unadilla 2012 left him with a leg that was hard to put back together.

While he plots a comeback to racing, Byrner has kept busy working with some different teams and riders and I caught up to him to see how that was going and what else was new.

You’re working with Mike Alessi and the MotoConcepts guys. How’s that going?

I started doing that back in October I believe, end of October/November. Just thought it would be something cool to do while I was seeing if my leg was going to get better after my last surgery in September. Just something for me to do to kill time and look at different avenues as far as what I could do in the future after I was done racing. It’s been going pretty good.

Mike’s definitely riding better now. He hasn’t had that many good results because of some bad luck, but he won a heat race which was a big deal for him. I think he’s gotten better so that’s pretty cool to see.

Image: Simon Cudby.

You yourself, how’s the leg? Talk about your recovery a little bit. You had another surgery after the end of the season that many people maybe don’t know about.

After Elsinore, pretty much right after that national I couldn’t even walk because my leg was just a little messed up. I had to have a surgery to re-correct it. Pretty big surgery. I had to have it all broken again and changed. They took 15 degrees out of my leg and brought it back across, kind of reset it all again. So I had to kind of start from scratch.

Since that last surgery though everything’s been going a lot better than what my recovery was before. Just trying to be patient with it this time and not get out there and ride around where I don’t belong. Everything’s been going pretty good with that. It’s only really been since I guess December that I could start doing stuff with it.

I had to have two and a half months without doing anything, it’s been going good though. I’ve just been doing therapy two days a week and then obviously working with Mike and stuff. It’s coming along. I would like to hope that in maybe four or six weeks I could race.

I’ve been riding for a few weeks now, but the load that it needs to be able to compete at that level’s a different of a load than you put on it just riding around.

Last summer didn’t go great for you at times. How frustrating is that when you were out there last summer and you can’t even really hold onto the bike?

You said at times and it was pretty much all the time. Obviously my leg was really bad. My tibia was in, like, five pieces. It’s hard for me to just say, yeah, the doctor didn’t do it right or he didn’t set it right and it wasn’t on the right angle, but I think with what I had and the injury that I had it was kind of like a jigsaw puzzle putting it back together.

So I guess they overlooked one little thing and it was hard enough just putting it back together, let alone getting it right. They obviously missed one little thing as far as the angle of my leg. Then when it started healing my body, I don’t know if it rejected it, it was set wrong, but it just started bending the wrong way. I had 15 degrees too much angle in my tibia from my knee to my ankle.

And that was pretty much just a nightmare. I couldn’t even stand on one leg and bend my knee. I didn’t have any strength in it. I probably shouldn’t have been out there at all trying to ride, but you always want to try and race, especially considering the position I was in when I broke it.

There’s so much more behind the scenes that you guys go through as racers that even us in the media and guys that are in it don’t really understand. And you’re out there gritting your teeth and getting roosted like, god damn-it, I’m half the guy I was.

Yeah, and I literally was. It’s hard too because as soon as you go back out on the track then everyone thinks that you’re perfect, when really 90 percent of the time there’s a lot of guys out there that have some type of little injury. Mine just wasn’t a normal little injury. I had to have a longer pedal on my brakes so I could even use the rear brake.

I couldn’t even drag my leg across the ground, so I never touched my right foot on the ground of any right-hander the whole summer. And because you can’t do that then you try to make up for it in the left-hand turns and that just creates more mistakes.

I didn’t get any testing time in. Everything was just wrong. I should have had it re-corrected as soon as everybody figured out what the problem was. And obviously at the races you’re like, well Hangtown’s coming, I need to just stick it out and see what we get. But then once you commit to that you’re kind of screwed.

It’s hard too because you have sponsors and everyone relying on you. They want to see you do what you did before you got hurt. I should have really just had it corrected and then lined up at Anaheim this year, is what really should have happened. Now it just prolonged everything and stretched it out. Now we’re a year and a half in when it could have been…

Image: Simon Cudby.

So you’re going to race again?

Yeah, I want to race again, I’m just not rushing it. My biggest thing is I’m not going to do what I did last year. I was miserable. I’d come off the track, I didn’t even break a sweat because I couldn’t even ride hard because my leg was so weak. It was like the worst six months of my life as far as riding a dirt bike. I’ve never been that miserable because I wasn’t myself, I couldn’t be myself as much as I wanted to be and as much as I tried.

If I gave it everything I had at a national I’d be on crutches for a day and a half. When I went in for my surgery to have it fixed I went in on crutches. I went in on crutches after Elsinore because I couldn’t walk after Elsinore, and then I left on crutches. I’m like, It’s not supposed to work like this. It’s tough, for sure.

But the racing thing, if you can get it back and find a ride you’ll line back up?

Yeah, and that’s the thing. My leg needs to at least be 80 percent of what my left leg is strength-wise before I consider competing at the level that you need to ride at. If it doesn’t get there and I’ve done everything that I could to try to get there, then so be it.

Then I’ll say okay, at that point I’d be done because I would be satisfied that I did everything that I could and not just walk away and a year later my leg would be back to normal and then go, shit, I shouldn’t retire.

If it becomes good, which it is improving all the time, and I’m riding – I just started riding again now – if it improves then I’ll definitely want to get back out there, and if not then we’ll look at a new chapter.

Your thoughts on Dean Ferris? I talked to him about his adaption and he mentioned he just doesn’t want to get hurt. He knows outdoors he’ll be better and this is a learning curve for him. But what do you think? What do you see so far?

Honestly for a guy who doesn’t really have that much supercross experience, I think he’s doing a great job. It definitely looks like he doesn’t want to get hurt a little bit. He’s a little timid in some sections. I think he just needs to not stress too much about that because I think that can go the other way for you.

I think every weekend he needs to just be smart and try and learn. I think he’s been doing that each weekend. For him to be in the top seven guys with really little time that he’s had here I think he’s doing a good job.

I think he’ll definitely be fast outdoors. I think that’s going to be his strong point obviously, but when you come here to need to have an open mind to be good at supercross because a lot of things revolve around that.

Image: Simon Cudby.

I think he’ll pick it up. I think he’ll be fine. It’s obviously something totally new to him too. It’s a lot different than Europe, quite different from Australia, and there’s a lot of fast guys. It doesn’t matter if you’re a factory guy or not, a lot of kids from California can ride supercross.

But I think he’s doing a great job and I think he just needs to try and learn as he goes this year without taking too many crazy risks and just be more confident in his own ability and I think he’ll be fine.

Finally Chad Reed. All of us experts talked about, it’d be cool to see him get some podiums, he’s definitely a top five guy, but can he win? Probably not. He’d probably need a lot to go right to win. Never mind coming from fifth and winning or this weekend holding off Kenny Roczen for 20 laps. What a story he’s making here (note: interview was done before Reed’s San Diego crash).

You guys don’t know much then, huh? I’m totally stoked for him. Am I surprised? No. I’ve been here all off-season so I know the work he’s put in. It’s funny because when Jason Thomas first came here in October or November he’s like, how does Chad look? And I’m like, he’s starting to look more like his old self. I said I think he’s going to be good. And then everyone else was like, he’s not going to be there. And I was just like kind of laughing because he’s worked his butt off and every time someone doubts him he likes to prove them wrong.

The more you guys tell him that he sucks the faster he’s going to go and the more determined he’s going to be. I don’t know if that’s really working out for everybody else but it’s working out for him. I’m super proud. He’s put in a lot of work this year and he’s definitely in probably the best shape of his life. He’s just happy again.

I know what he was going through with his knee last year and when he would train it would hurt him. He couldn’t train like he needed to train. If you can’t do everything how it needs to be done, there’s a lot more things that go into it than just when you line up.

In a way it’s a little bit maybe inspirational to you too. You’re not winning as many races as he is but you’re like, that guy did it, I can do it. I can come back.

I always tell him age just a number. I did my best, and even Timmy [Ferry], we did our best years really when we were 30-32 years of age. If you’re happy and you’re in shape I think it actually helps you when you’re older because you’re smarter.

You’ve been though a lot and you know what you want and when you get what you want you have a great group of guys around you that are super smart and figure stuff out and they all look at the big picture. I think it’s pretty awesome. I’m just happy if I can hang for half a lap.