According to reports in USA Today Ryan Lochte had a true run in with a young fan during a recent trip to Florida that has resulted in a knee injury that will keep him out of the water. An excited young woman rushed Lochte and tripped when Ryan apparently caught her and nailed his knee on the curb. As a result Lochte has torn his MCL and sprained his ACL.
According to a statement from his publicist he’ll now be taking a break from training and competitions however, “his medical team expects him to make a full and speedy recovery and Ryan thanks everyone for their well wishes.”
Obviously this injury makes it unlikely Ryan Lochte will be competing in the 2013 Duel in the Pool scheduled December 20 and 21 in Glasgow according to report on NBC Olympic Talk. Typically an injury of this magnitude can take well over 6 months to recover.
UPDATE: Dave Wagner, an evening anchor from NBC Charlotte’s WCNC, posted several tweets from what appears to be an interview with SwimMAC Carolina head coach, David Marsh, about Ryan Lochte’s injury that resulted from catching a fan. From Wagners tweets, Marsh said:
“He wasn’t prepared to catch her and when that happened, it buckled his knees.” “It’s unclear if he’ll have surgery. Some of that depends on the severity…” “When he dealt with this in the past, he came back better than ever from it.” “After the Gainesville & Charlotte medical teams visit this,they’ll be deciding what to do moving forward.” “It looks like he has a pretty substantial rehab time here in Charlotte ahead of him.” “He actually has loose joints,which is part of the talent 4 swimming, but not obviously ideal for catching fans.”
Click here to view Dave Wagner’s twitter account and read the tweets for yourself.
The story was spun well, Lochte isn’t known for making the best decisions. To bad the reality show wasn’t still filming, could have been telling footage.
I have had numerous opportunities to see Ryan interact with fans and he is as gracious and hands-on a “star” as you could possibly hope for. It doesn’t surprise me that he was in close contact with a fan; he doesn’t put any barriers between himself and fans when he is doing swimming events (meets/clinics/appearances)..
Too bad his “reality” show made him look like a frat-boy douche. He would have been much better served if they showed the real Ryan on deck and with fans as opposed to the “reality” Ryan that they thought would get viewers.
Where is NoLochteFan? 🙂
Oh Yahoo, everyone is talking trash on Lochte. His reality tv completely ruined his reputation unfortunately.
Here in France, the buzz is about the girl. Most of people who comment that drama on the French sport websites think the girl was probably obese to destroy Lochte like that.
And about his reality TV show, it’s actually aired on E in France. I have watched a few minutes. It’s really pathetic. It sounds so commercial. It’s not natural. But it hasn’t changed my feeling about him. He’s a nice guy.
This actually made me laugh out loud. and ya his TV show is pretty crap, I’ve met him a few times and he remembers my name every time. super nice guy.
Florida vs Georgia football game this past weekend in Jacksonville. Worlds Largest Cocktail Party…
Ryan is a great guy and always has time for his fans, but I have to agree with previous post sounds like drinking was involved, or a case of flirting gone bad (don’t know how old the fan was)
Sounds more like a drunken injury to me
Oh Reezy!! I hope that he makes a full and speedy recovery. He should have gone to Italy with Cullen and the rest of Team Elite instead of going back to Gainesville. Alas!
I wonder where he is going to recover and do rehab?