Cycling: Crash puts Scully out of Commonwealth Games

Southland cyclist Tom Scully's Commonwealth Games dream is over after he crashed into a power pole at 65km/h during the Tour of Ireland.

Scully, 20, escaped any broken bones but was left lying in a Galway hospital bed with his badly swollen right leg in a brace, having undergone two separate surgeries for compartment syndrome to reduce the swelling in his knee.

X-rays and an MRI scan showed torn ACL and PCL ligaments in his right knee, and destroyed lateral ligaments and hamstring attachment point.

He had left his hospital bed just three times since the crash and could manage only 10 steps on crutches.

Doctors told Scully he would be back on his bike by the October Games in Delhi but to be fit to compete would be a "superhuman effort".

"So all that said the year is sadly over with Commonwealth Games out the window for 2010," he said in an email to Cycling Southland.

Scully, the national scratch champion, had an impressive first season of international competition, with two golds and a bronze medal at track World Cup events and a seventh placing at the world championships.

The crash happened on stage three of the Tour of Ireland when Scully was in the leading bunch with compatriot Marc Ryan.

As he mounted a sprint finish passing a narrow stone bridge, Scully hit handlebars with a rival about 300m from the finish.

"I lost control, shot off to the right, tried to keep it up and hold it straight, but lost it, both wheels were sliding sideways, carbon shattering everywhere," he wrote.

"I smashed my right femur into a power pole at about 60-65km/h. My body went left of pole and right leg knee down went to the right of the pole, bending my right knee the way it's not meant to bend, then I tumbled along the gutter."

Scully, who has one more bout of surgery scheduled before returning to New Zealand in a fortnight, was upbeat about his recovery programme which should see him back competing in the New Year.

"From here a lot of recovery/rehab is to be done. But I'm staying positive about it all. It's just a bit of a setback, slight change from full gas training... shouldn't be too much trouble."