Steve Mercer, a former road racer based in Maidstone, announced that he is preparing to ride a motorcycle for the first time since 2018.
Mercer hasn’t been riding since crashing on a course car on Man TT Island in 2018. In other words, it’s been about seven years since I last rode my recently purchased Honda CBR1000RR-R.
In the collision, Mercer suffered multiple injuries, including a pelvic fracture, a fracture in the larynx, and fractures to both the lungs and the right femur. The injury left him in the hospital for five months.
“To be honest, I can’t put into words how good this feels,” Mercer wrote in an Instagram post.
“I just brought this 2021 Fireblade and feel like I’ve hit a massive milestone. I haven’t been to a superbike in seven years, but I always believed I’d ride it again one day.
“I certainly wasn’t going to end all of that crashes in 2018.
“I don’t know where this is going to go. If I just ride a brand hatch and finish the way I wanted, or start riding again regularly.”
Initially, Mercer’s injury lost 10cm tall, but that reduced to 3cm from his pre-examination height.
He also loses function on his right leg, which means that he will need to change his motorcycle to ride.
“You’ll need to change a few bits like the fit of the power shifter. This means you’ll need to change the gears on the handlebars, find a way to step in, and get a sort of riding kit, but once your bike is ready, I’ll book it for a brand hatch for the day,” he said.
The choice of fireblade was based on loyalty to Honda, Mercer explained.
“Honda has always been my favorite bike when I was racing,” he said, explaining his motorcycle choices in an interview with MCN.
“It all didn’t work, and when I was in the hospital in Liverpool for five months, Honda himself called his wife Caroline, asked if they needed something, and paid most of the hotel bills for the whole time Caroline was in Liverpool.
“I feel loyal to the brand, because I had signed them twice. When I built up world durability with John McGuinness and Connor Cummins in 2016, and unfortunately when it was wrong.”
He added:
“When I was in the hospital, a lot of people said to me, ‘You’ll never ride a bike again.’ And looking back, I don’t know if the doctors and nurses were motivating it to me and telling them to prove they were wrong.
“That’s how I took it because I thought I was just proving you wrong.”