HUTCHY: MISSION IMPOSSIBLE
Unless you’ve been living under a rock, or simply don’t give a damn about the TT, the name Ian Hutchinson should be well and truly smacked on your radar. Endearingly known as the ‘Bingley Bullet’, the soft spoken Yorkshireman remains the first and only person to have taken all five TT wins in a single year, back in 2010. And despite horrifically breaking his leg later that season during a BSB round at Silverstone, which demanded countless operations, fixators and pleading with doctors not to cut off his blackening and blood deprived lower left leg, he somehow overcame the odds to look every bit set for a return to the Mountain Course that very next season. Or at least before a freak 5mph accident on a trail bike turned his world upside down once more.
But while most others might have accepted fate and given up on his chances of ever walking, let alone racing again, Hutchy and his skilled surgeon Matija Krkovic, went all out to fix the unfixable. And with some incredible talent, commitment and bloody mindedness, not to mention numerous setbacks along the way, incredibly, Hutchy’s leg remained in place.
Better still, after taking time to recuperate and adapting to a right side gear shift, Hutchy’s successful racing comeback, bagging third place at the 2011 Macau GP, had many a rider, fan and team owner eating their hat. And ever since the wins have been flowing in, cranking his TT tally of wins up to 16
