Kyla’s back on the bike
Kyla Harper-Jones is back on the bike and claimed her first podium finish - a remarkable recovery from her 2022 accident that could have left her unable to walk again.
April 24, 2024
A young Scottsdale woman who broke her back in a motorbike accident in November 2022 is back on her bike and thriving in the endeavour she loves.
Just 18 months after the crash threatened her entire future, Kyla Harper-Jones has claimed her first State podium and has a US adventure firmly in her sights.
“It feels awesome to be back. I love it – it’s too much of a passion to let it go,” the 16-year-old former Scottsdale High School student said.
“Even when the accident happened I knew I was getting back on.”
She recalls the incident at the end of a training session at Santarena Park.
“I was tired and fatigued but said to myself ‘just one more lap, one more jump’ but I hit the finish line table-top and the bike flew out from under me,” she recalled.
“I remember I over jumped it heaps and I remember landing on the ground and feeling the shock go up my
back and shatter my vertebrae and my tailbone.
“I could feel my toes tingling
and I knew I couldn’t move. They loaded me into an ambulance and took me to the Recreation Ground in Scottsdale and from there they flew me to the Royal Hobart Hospital.
“The paramedics knew I had spinal cord damage but doctors weren’t sure until after the second surgery whether I was going to walk again.”
After being advised to stay off her bike for 12 months, Kyla said the temptation to return to training got the better of her after nine months.
Earlier this month she finished second in the Cambridge leg of the State round for women in the 125cc-250cc class.
“It was my first ever podium in a State round and so I am pretty stoked with that,” she said.
She will line up for the final race in the series at Goshen on May 18-19.
Kyla first started riding in 2021 after “getting obsessed” with the machines when her mother bought one – now she has big career goals.
“It sounds really big but I want to go pro and start racing on the mainland and move to America but I know there will be a lot of training involved,” she said.
“I will need to train very hard and work out and eat healthy and have a good mindset but at the moment I train a few times a week at a mate’s farm and get out and ride as
much as I can around work as a first-year apprentice mechanic in Launceston.
“I just really would love to thank everyone for all the good wishes I have been sent during my recovery.”