This year has been a horrible season for NPS Monster Energy Kawasaki’s Jake Moss. After breaking his leg in the US right at the beginning of the year, Mossy crashed again soon after getting back on the bike and again broke his leg (a different break from the first). What followed has been a roller-coaster of complications, frustrations and question marks, so we hit the 27-year-old up to get the low-down on where he’s at.

Image: Jeff Crow.

Jake, it sucks to see you sidelined again, mate. What happened with your latest crash?

It was only my second day back on the bike after my injury as I’d made a promise not to ride before I got married. I was out practicing and missed a gear in the whoops and got sent over the bars. I broke my leg right at the top of the tibia, which is a bit of a strange break; I wonder if I landed on a rock or something. I got carted off to Brisbane and unfortunately the break wasn’t the worst of it. I got compartment syndrome and they had to do emergency surgery so that I didn’t lose all the feeling in my foot and calf.

Wow, that’s intense. Is that why they cut your leg open?

Yeah. I got cut from the top of the knee to my ankle on both sides and received, like, 100 external stitches and 300 little internal ones. It’s a pretty crazy operation and a lot of people get infected from it. I’ve had staph three times in the past and they reckon if I get it again it’s going to really hard to get rid of. That was pretty scary, but everything’s looking good and they cuts will be healed in four weeks.

What about the bone break?

That’s all looking good too. Because I broke the bone at the top they had to pull my knee-cap off and put a nail down into the top of the bone. I’m glad I didn’t need a rod as it’s hard to ride with them and there’s always the chance you bend them in a crash. With the nail, once it’s healed it’ll be fine. It’s only an eight-week process, so I’ve only got five weeks left to go.

How are you feeling now, both physically and mentally?

Mentally it’s been tough to have two big injuries like this. The first week in hospital this last time was hard, deciding whether I want to ride again, going through the motions and hating motocross because it’s not worth it when I could work a regular job and have my weekends off. But once you start to mend you get the itch to get back racing and that’s already starting to happen. Physically, I won’t be back until the start of the supercross. My fitness won’t be bad, but I’ve lost a lot of body mass this year and not racing motocross has put me behind the eight-ball. I haven’t ridden properly since December last year! Supercross is going to be tough, but I want to keep it rubber-side down for four months and see what eventuates from there.

Source: Kawasaki Motors Australia.

How has NPS Monster Energy Kawasaki been during this time? They must be pretty gutted for you.

They’ve been great, mate. Obviously they aren’t pumped with the situation with me this year but they’re still sticking behind me. It’s hard with contracts, as you have to complete a certain percentage of races and I haven’t done that, but they’re still behind me which is unreal and has been a massive help financially. I’m happy that they’ve given Dylan Long a shot for the second half of the championship and I really do hope he goes well. At the same time it’s frustrating that I haven’t had the opportunity to work with Michael Marty this year as I’ve done well with him in the past at Serco.

And what does the future hold for you?

It’s all up in the air, to tell the truth. The other thing that happened that not many people know is that I actually died in hospital due to a miscalculation in the drugs given to me and I had to be resuscitated. That scared me and my wife a lot. We’ve been talking with the NPS crew – they’re big-business people who have supported me for years – and they’re asking how long I can keep doing what I do if I want to start a family. We’ll see what happens after supercross and how my results go, but I’m not holding my breath after such a tough year. An offer has to be the right money; no-one in the top 10 should be riding for the minimum wage. My wife and I want to have a family soon and if I can’t make it work financially then we’ll have to make some tough decisions about my future with racing. I’m pretty lucky that I can go to a good job tomorrow and have mates who will give me a shot. Not many other riders have that security, so I’m not too worried about what the future holds.

Well hopefully it all works out well for you, dude. Rest up and we’ll see you trackside soon.

Thanks mate. See you there.