Pol Espargaro to undergo surgery in Barcelona

Spaniard re-fractured his left collarbone in FP3 and was operated on by Dr Mir on Saturday

After missing the Czech GP, Austrian GP and British GP through injury, Pol Espargaro’s (Red Bull KTM Factory Racing) luckless 2018 continued after a crash at Turn 15 in FP3 left the Spaniard with a fractured collarbone – the same one that was injured in Brno. 

Espargaro didn’t need an operation on the collarbone after his Brno crash but after re-aggravating the injury in Aragon, he’ll head back to Barcelona to undergo surgery on Saturday. MotoGP™ Trauma Specialist Dr Xavier Mir spoke about the 2013 Moto2™ World Champion’s condition:

“Pol took a big hit to the left shoulder, which he had already injured six weeks earlier. He was currently in the recovery phase, he no longer felt any discomfort during the last consultation we had. Unfortunately, this fall caused a fracture in the same place and this time he will have to undergo surgery. So I am going to go with him to Barcelona, where we will try to operate this afternoon so that he is likely to return to Thailand.”

Once more, KTM are down to just one rider at a Grand Prix with Bradley Smith flying solo and it’s a situation that Pit Beirer describes as “terrible”: “It puts me in a terrible situation. It’s sad. He crashed on his shoulder and broke the collarbone, but it wasn’t even the old injury as the biggest problem because after 6 weeks the collarbone was okay again, but he just crashed and broke the collarbone again. It’s a common injury in our world but it comes in a terrible time for us because we have so many things on our agenda to do, I’ve been waiting 6 weeks to confirm them with Pol because he’s the rider that brings them to the racetrack next year and that sets us back again. With Mika injured, Pol not there, 0 points on his side since Sachensring, I can’t see how the bike develops, then Bradley Smith in FP3 today made a 48.0 and last year in FP3 Marquez was first with 48.2 so the bike is developing, everything is going in a good direction, but I just can’t prove it.” 

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