Iouri “Ipod” Podladtchikov was sent to the hospital after he crashed face first at the bottom of his competition halfpipe run at X Games Aspen. It was a scary situation as Ipod stayed on the ground for 20 minutes as emergency personnel worked to stabilize him.
The Washington Post reports scans for brain and neck injuries came back negative and the X Games said Podladtchikov was “alert and conversing” in a statement. Ipod did suffer a broken nose.
“It was terrible. You don’t really know how he’s doing. He wasn’t moving, there was a crowd of people around him. You can’t help but feel for him. Definitely gets your stomach turned, gets you in a weird head space.” -Jake Pates
Podladtchikov was born in the Soviet Union but grew up in Switzerland and has competed for that country for much of his career. We wish him a speedy recovery and really hope he is well enough to compete in South Korea…the field would be diminished without his presence. Get well soon dude!