Saul Raisin
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| Personal information | |
|---|---|
| Full name | Saul Raisin |
| Date of birth | January 06, 1983 (age 24) |
| Country |  United States |
| Height | 1.80 m |
| Weight | 69 kg |
| Team information | |
| Current team | Crédit Agricole |
| Discipline | Road |
| Role | Rider |
| Rider type | Climber |
| Professional team(s) | |
| 2005- | Crédit Agricole |
| Infobox last updated on: | |
| January 12, 2007 | |
Saul Raisin (born 1983-01-06, in Dalton, Georgia) is a professional road bicycle racer with UCI ProTeam Crédit Agricole.
Contents |
[edit] Career
Raisin began racing mountain bikes at 13, and moved to road bikes when he was 17.[1][2]
Raisin had a good start to his professional career with Crédit Agricole in 2005, coming 37th in the Tour de Suisse, later having the best result of his career with a 13th place in the Int. Österreich-Rundfahrt (or Tour of Austria). He then went on to win the King of the Mountains jersey in the Tour de l'Avenir[3].
In early 2006 Raisin won the third stage of the Le Tour de Langkawi and ended the Malaysian Tour placed eleventh overall. At the 2006 Tour of California Raisin came 17th overall. He raced the Milan-Sanremo in March and on April 4th was racing in the first stage of the Circuit de la Sarthe. Two kilometres from the finish Raisin clipped a wheel, crashed and landed on his head, breaking his clavicle and hip.[1][4]
[edit] 2006 Crash aftermath
At the hospital in Angers doctors took hourly CAT scans which showed that a haematoma had formed in Raisin's brain, which two days later burst. A neurosurgeon operated to relieve the pressure and had to remove part of Raisin's right temporal lobe.[2] Raisin went into a coma and emerged only after 6 days. The haemorrhage and surgery caused significant weakness on his left side and marked memory loss.[5] When he was stabilized he was flown from France to the Shepherd Center in Atlanta, Georgia. He stayed in the hospital for four weeks, going through extensive therapy - including re-learning to walk and eat. Afterwards he continued his therapy at the Shepherd Center outpatient program, Pathways.[2]
Should Saul completely recover he cannot race until at least 18 months after the accident - "another blow to the head could be disastrous."[6] In August Raisin moved from indoor training on rollers to riding outside[6], in late November Raisin completed an 8 hour, 200 kilometre ride from Chatsworth, Georgia to Brasstown Bald, crossing 8 mountain passes.[7] In January 2007 Raisin attended the Crédit Agricole team training camp in the South of France.[8]
[edit] External links
[edit] References
- ^ a b Rich Tyler, Remarkable Twist of Fate, Ride Cycling Review, Winter 2006, page 168.
- ^ a b c Kristi Daughtridge, A Long Road: Saul Raisin's story, Spinal Column: The magazine of the Shepherd Center, Fall 2006, p12-13.
- ^ Tour de l'Avenir 2005 Overall Climber Standing, letour.fr, Accessed 2006-12-18
- ^ Three falls in the first stage, CircuitCyclist.Sarthe.com, Accessed 2006-12-17.
- ^ Shane Stokes, Raisin racing to recover, CyclingNews, August 10, 2006.
- ^ a b Shane Stokes, The legacy of the crash, CyclingNews, August 10, 2006.
- ^ Saul Raisin, 8 hour Epic Ride!! 8heure épique roule, SaulRaisin.com, November 27, 2006.
- ^ Saul Raisin, Team Camp, SaulRaisin.com, January 20, 2007.
| Riders on Crédit Agricole |
|---|
|
Francesco Bellotti | László Bodrogi | William Bonnet | Alexandre Botcharov | Pietro Caucchioli | Anthony Charteau | Julian Dean | Christope Edaleine | Jimmy Engoulvent | Dmitry Fofonov | Angelo Furlan | Patrice Halgand | Sébastien Hinault | Jonathan Hivert | Thor Hushovd | Mads Kaggestad | Christophe Kern | Christophe Laurent | Christophe Le Mevel | Cyril Lemoine | Jean-Marc Marino | Rémy Pauriol | Benoit Poilvet | Saul Raisin | Mark Renshaw | Nicholas Roche | Pierre Rolland | Yannick Talabardon |
| Manager |
| Roger Legeay |
