At the opening round of the 2015 MX Nationals at Horsham, one of the MXD title favourites, Dylan ‘Dee’ Wilson suffered a horrific crash that saw him placed in an induced coma for two full weeks. Following an overwhelming wave of support from family and industry, the friendly 18-year-old is back home at Tweed Heads and is well on the road to a remarkable recovery. MotoOnline.com.au caught up with Dee to get his thoughts and recollections from the experience.

Image: Jeff Crow.

Horsham…

I didn’t have the best build-up to the nationals this year. I broke my thumb six weeks before Horsham and was in a cast for three-and-a-half weeks. After I had the cast removed it was intense with getting bikes ready, training and race prep. When I got to Horsham I wasn’t sure how I’d go, but I seemed to go alright in the first race. I remember getting interviewed by Brenden Harrison afterward, and I’m still getting little bits of the day coming back to me. A mate who broke his back at Horsham seen me the other day and said “yeah you came and saw me at RACESAFE”, which brought back that memory for me. Originally I didn’t remember anything from Horsham, but after I woke up I saw a photo of my bike and that jogged a memory of where we parked at the track. The doctors are amazed at how much I remember; they said most people don’t remember the week leading up to an incident, but I can remember up to an hour beforehand.

Being in a coma…

When you’re in a coma it’s weird because apparently you know what’s going on around you, but you can’t respond. Waking up took a while and I don’t remember much as I was off my head on morphine, but my brother Jay told me I was saying and doing all sorts of weird stuff. One thing that happened apparently is that I was put in a room with another bloke and he was snoring and I thought it was dad, who snores a bit. I went off at this guy, swearing and carrying on and they had to call my parents to come and settle me down, then took me to my own room. Then I had some weird story about how I was in Japan, but I don’t remember any of it – morphine and me are a bad mix!

Industry support…

I didn’t realise how bad my accident was until I woke up enough to look at Facebook and saw all the messages of support and concern. Brendon Watson is a good family friend of ours and organised the Stay Strong tees and got the fundraising going for us, and Kustom MX made a heap of DDubb10 stickers up to sell off. It was so humbling to see everyone come together and offer their support. It’s just like a big family.

Image: Jeff Crow.

Recovery…

I’ve been home for three weeks and went to rehab on Friday for the first time. They’re really happy with my progress so far. The physio, who checked out my balance and that sort of thing, said he doesn’t need to see me again and said I could even do light rides on the stationary bike as long as I don’t push it. I had my first ride yesterday and it felt so good. From here on it’ll be speech therapy and the OT lady will do tests on me each Friday. Because I had a fit at the track I’m not allowed to drive a car or ride a bike for six months, so there’s going to be a lot more sitting in front of the TV ahead. I made a Netflix account the other day and I’ve been smashing Prison Break flat out every day.

The future…

It’s going to be a long road to recovery, so we’ll see what happens. I could find something else that I want to do away from bikes, but riding is all I’ve done since I was four. If my body is ready and I feel ready I’ll step up to MX2 next year, but we’ll just have to see what happens. I’m not going to promise one way or the other, but I’ve got an old 125 in the shed that I might get on first. It’s not fast enough to make me crash so I’ll ride that and keep myself out of trouble! We’ll have to see what the future holds for my racing career.

Instagram name…

When I first woke up Jay showed me the ‘deez nuts’ video that’s going viral at the moment. I thought it was real funny and it just so happens that it contains my nickname Dee. I’ve had my @ddubb10 username for so long, so I thought I’d change it up to @deezzznutss10 until the video gets old and people get sick of it. The problem is though, now someone’s created a fake @ddubb10 account and in the bio it says “I stole your username. Ask me nicely and I’ll give it back”. I’m hoping it’s a mate who did it but I can’t figure out who it is!