3gb of photo’s sweeeet 
. can someone scan the xrays for us? 
After reading this, I gotta say - let it never be said that Ken Looi is not a tough old bastard 
and a really nice guy too! Get better soon man.
Here’s a before X-ray. The break is clearly visible above the exsisting Nepalese plate and screws. I visited Ken in the very flash Bumrungrad hospital in Bangkok yesterday. We talked and uploaded more photos (a measly 400MB) for several hours in the time between my overnight train and my flight to NZ. We had lunch from a bakery-type place on the first floor named ‘Au Bon Pain’, which sounds a little ominous if you can’t read French! Ken was in good spirits and hoping to fly back to NZ on Wed or Thurs.
ouch!
Get well!
Could it be the excessive amount of unicycling that has made your bones weak? 
Interesting!
[in re: x-ray pix]
EEEEEEEEEWWWWWWW!!!
i just wet my pants.
.max
I think that it has more to do with inadvertently applying Fred Flinstone brakes.
Wow now that’s a broken leg! did they have to take the old hardware out before putting the fibula back together or did they just add to it?
I had similar hardware in my ankle but I had it removed a year ago and it feels much better without it.
Take care, I hope you heal well and hang in there.
Dan
I wonder if the existance of the old hardware, and its location in proximity to the new breaks, made the new breaks more likely to happen? In other words, when you have a strongly reinforced area, the areas immediately adjacent to it become your new weak points.
Of course, given a previous injury, you don’t very well get a choice about whether that hardware should be there…
I very well may have caused the bone to break higher than it would have otherwise but I doubt that it made the bone more likely to break.
With hardware you do have the option to have it taken out but I was told that it shouldn’t be take out unless it bothers you because of the posibility of complications. I was also told not to have it removed before 18 months.
After you have it out the bone is weakend untill the screw holes heal in because in efect you have a perforated bone.
Wow. That’s some X ray.
I bet you’re right John Foss, about the plate leading to a weak point. Kind of looke as if the tibia is fractured twice.
I wonder how much hardware he’ll come home with. I bet he sets off the metal detectors at the airports now.
Medical costs here in the US are something. I just paid $75 for ten tamiflu pills. I feel better but not in the pocket!
Thanks for posting the Xray Tony. I should try to get hold of the post-ORIF Xray to show all the new screws. But it’s basically a plate next to the tibia. They removed the diastasis screw (that big long one) but left the rest of the hardware in place because they did not want to create more tissue trauma on top of this acute injury.
In theory my ankle shouldn’t have been all that much stronger once it healed, but I guess in practice it may well have led to my tibia fracture instead of my ankle this time. Although, I suspect if you plant your leg on the ground with all your weight behind it at 25-30km/h that it will break in the same place.
Weak bones…I dunno, I think unicycling is a risky sport for leg injuries. For example, in 14yrs of mountainbiking, the only injury I had was 8 stitches to the elbow. In 5yrs of Unicycling, I’ve had 1 broken ankle, 1 broken tib/fib, 8 stitches to the leg, multiple leg scars from my pedals, a triquetral fracture, and 3 sprained ankles. I had never broken any bones up until I broke my ankle 3yrs ago.
Anyway, I’m doing fine now. Had most of the LUT crew pass through over the last few days. It was great to catch up on how the tour went and all the photos. It sounds like everyone had a really awesome trip. In a group our size, it’s amazing to have had only one major injury.
I enjoyed organising and what I rode of the Laos Unitour, despite the accident. I’ll have further updates and photos up later this week. Thanks to everyone that supported the tour and our charity.
I’m being flown home this Friday, and (ironically), will be admitted via the Emergency Dept where I used to work. The Orthopaedic Registrar that is expecting me was my old House Surgeon
That’s all for now,
Thanks,
Ken
I think it is the drinking and smoking.
That’s embarrasing ! Tho I guess thay know you unicycle and so won;t have to do the whole " you broke it doing WHAT" routine. Good luck with the recovery , take it easy and try not to start training again TOO soon.
Sarah
Its Ok, I have no chance of beating you in the marathon this summer- I’m way to unfit, evenif I don;thave abroken leg. Roger on the other hand…did a little silver haired bloke jump out in front of you just before the hub went bang?
Thanks Sarah,
Yes it’s my goal to make it to Unicon, although I don’t know how fit I’m likely to be. Actually I don’t think fitness will be as much of a problem as any weakness/stiffness in the leg. That affects how fast you pedal much more than fitness alone. Roger is fast, be tough enough to beat without a broken leg 
Just another explanation regarding the hub failure- it happened with the first generation hub which has been subject of a product recall because of this problem. I did not have time to swap it over before the tour, so decided to stay with the first generation hub (doh!). It has been replaced by a 12 pin hub which has been redesigned to address this problem. The 12 pin hub was used extensively throughout the LUT (we had four riders on the 2nd generation hub) without any problems. It engages very positively whereas the 1st generation hub had a tendency to slip during engagement. Anyway, I have a 2nd Gen hub now which I’ll rebuild the unicycle with.
Ken
Were any of you using the new frames (with the two clamps) with the 2nd gen hubs, and did they hold up okay?
Joe
Yes they all seem to know I unicycle back at home. In fact I think the whole medical profession in NZ does, since they featured me in the last magazine from our main insurance company. Anyway, here in Thailand I’ve managed to maintain that I fell off whilst “cycling”. It saved a lot of explaining regarding having 19 people riding across Laos on one wheel. But even then the Doctors here were like: “You were biking in Laos? Why? What’s in Laos?”
lol
Everyone was using the 2nd generation hub apart from me. Three of the four other riders used the triple clamp frames with no hassles, one rider had the old frame with 2nd gen hub.
Florian was very concerned that I was still using the 1st gen hub, but like I said, I was not going to be able to have had it swapped over before the tour.
aww come on thailand is down with the one wheel wonders. But I guess if you are trying to keep low profile then you are doing well.
I’m keeping a low profile, but the Laos Unitour was shown on Thai national (TV) news 2wks ago. Several of the places we visited had seen us on the news.