British star Leon Camier (Red Bull Honda World Superbike Team) is preparing for a big weekend as he heads to the Prosecco DOC UK Round continuing to cover from an injury sustained around MotorLand Aragon, and he’s learning that patience is a virtue. 

Returning to action around Imola two weeks ago, Camier discovered his fitness levels still weren’t at 100%, and he chose to sit out of the remainder of the weekend after competing on Friday. He will now head to Donington Park with the hope his body has made some more steps towards recovery, so he can put on a show for his home fans. 

“It’s a tricky one because I feel better in normal day to day stuff, but the pain is still there,” begins the 31 year old. “It’s getting better slowly, which is hard because I expect the recovery to be quicker after experience with other injuries. But I’ve been told this can last for months on end, and until I get back on the bike I don’t really know how I’ll be.” 

Becoming a matter of patience, which is a difficult quality for a rider to have, Camier has been trying a variety of different methods to get back to full fitness. “With other injuries you can push for it and you can force recovery a bit quicker. But with this I’ve had every treatment possible; I was using an indiba machine, magnetic treatment and even having physio. I’ve had everything possible to try and get everything going again but it still needs time.”

In regards to competing over the weekend at Donington Park, he is keen to try again but knows he can’t push his body too far. “I’m going to try and race again and see what happens, but until I get on the bike I don’t really know. In Imola it was four weeks after the crash and I tried riding, but at Donington it will be six weeks which is still so early.”

“I had a few days off after Imola,” continues Camier. “I was in more pain again with the muscles from the riding, I was sorer than before! So I took a few days off, went back to Andorra, back to training and got the body moving again. When it’s quite hard for the body you can’t sleep because you’re just in pain, you can’t turn over, you can’t do anything.” 

Heading to Imola prepared to ride, getting back on the bike and then ending up not competing is a big challenge for anyone, and for the Honda rider it was no different: “It’s a different mindset, I went there and didn’t know if they would let me ride. Then when I tried, I wasn’t in control so I ended up having another crash because I couldn’t ride properly. We tried to do a longer run in the second session to see how I felt. But I had so much pain from the first session, my body tightened up and I was even worse in the second session. When I needed to try to push hard I couldn’t, I had nothing, so we decided to can it.”

Despite the pain he has been suffering with, Camier is not hoping for a repeat of Imola as his goal is to get out on track for his home crowds, but understands he has to play it carefully. “Committing to the full weekend is harder, especially with Saturday as it’s a full on day. What I’m worried about this weekend is if my body keeps tightening up that I’m going to keep getting worse and worse over the weekend. So we’re going to make a bit of a plan and work out what’s best for the body.” 

“I’m looking forward to riding in front of the home fans, I’ve got to not try and see it as an added pressure. If I can’t ride properly I’m only dangerous to myself and to other riders, there’s no point riding around in 15th and falling off and potentially making the situation worse for the next races. But it’s not an easy decision to make, to pull out of a weekend.”

However, even when he is at the circuit, he will always have his uses for the team: “I watch the session from the service road when I’m not riding. It’s something I started to do on the Friday at Imola, and there’s some things I could see of how the bike is working compared to the others. I could see lines Jake and Jason were taking, I can try to understand what they’re trying to do. I could see a lot from the outside of the track but its better if I’m riding!”

Keep up with Camier’s progress as he takes on the Prosecco DOC UK Round this weekend, all with the WorldSBK VideoPass.