Alise Willoughby remembers where she was when the phone rang. She had just returned home to Minnesota to take part in a charity event, and the best BMX racer of her generation was on her way to Target Field, where she was supposed to throw out the ceremonial first pitch before a Twins game. Her husband, Sam, was supposed to be on the trip, too.
But after missing out on a medal at the Rio Olympics three weeks earlier, he decided to stay in California, and begin working to rectify the situation at the Tokyo Games. It was on a seemingly benign portion of the BMX track in Chula Vista, where the couple had trained for years, that the future they both imagined changed in a blink. Sam was warming up over the rhythm section, a mellow stretch of rolling humps, when the Australian fell backward out of a wheelie, landing on the top of his head.
He lay there motionless as the father of a junior rider, who happened to be an EMT, rushed over and began giving him a headto-toe examination. The innocent crash had unimaginable repercussions. Paramedics canceled the inbound ambulance in favor of a helicopter, which whisked him to San Diego, where surgeons delivered the news: He had broken his back.
He was paralyzed. "It was such a fluke," said Alise Willoughby, who eight years later is among the favorites to win gold at the Paris Olympics next month. "It was a little routine thing.
Then he made a mistake on something he did every day for 10 years prior, you know? So it's like, things sometimes .
