Image: Foremost Media.

Scans this week have discovered that GasGas Racing Team’s Dylan Wills raced with a broken tibia bone in his left leg at Saturday night’s AUSX Open, salvaging 11th overall despite being injured in a heavy qualifying crash.

Wills had been P7 in the opening practice/qualifying session, but was ejected from his MC 450F over the triple in the final qualifier, bumping him down the order to 10th on combined times.

After managing 14-11-9 scores across the trio of finals, Wills underwent further medical attention on Monday this week, where it was revealed that he has broken a bone in the lower part of his leg.

“That crash in qualifying was a scary one,” Wills recalled. “I just clipped my foot in a rut on the up-ramp and it reefed my leg back into a superman in the air… it definitely wasn’t ideal. I hurt my ankle quite a bit, so the Racesafe guys strapped me up and helped me to get back out there. I wasn’t 100 percent sure that I’d be able to race, so the plan was to just try and see how I felt.

“I was riding in a fair amount of pain, but I was able to push through and even managed to gradually better my results through each main event. We ended the night P11, so obviously not where I wanted to be, but now that I’m home and have gotten some scans, I found out I actually broke the bottom of my tibia. So with that, I guess I’m pretty happy with myself for soldiering on and finishing the night.”

Wills – who took charge of the GasGas Racing Team premier class entry follow for the five-round AUSX series – finished seventh in the final standings after achieving a best result of fifth at Redcliffe 2.