What?
It’s the age-old question that comes up time and time again at dinner parties across the world – who’s the top two-wheeled sportsman at getting stuff in their eye and then having to miss races because of it? Of course the answer for the last few years has always been Marc Marquez.
How?
Marc has been getting stuff in his eye from his early days in Moto2 when after a routine crash he suffered from diplodocus – which is the posh medical term for ‘being dizzy’ and is commonly suffered by Scotsmen after Burns Night or when asked to make a donation to charity.
Since his Moto2 incident Marc has routinely got stuff in his eye throughout his MotoGP career and even last year at home when he fell off his motocross bike and copped an olive in his retina or something (full factual story here).
So, when it comes to a two-wheeled sportsman having random peeper problems then Marc is the top of everyone’s list…until maybe now…
Who?
Step forward, and trip over something blurry on the floor, professional cyclist Biniam Girmay.
Earlier in the week Girmay, who according to Wikipedia originates from Eritrean – but we’re not convinced that’s a real place, became a woke hero by being the first black African winner of a Grand Tour cycling stage.
So?
It wasn’t until after the historic win that the optical anguish started for poor Biniam. Whilst on the winner’s podium, immediately after the race, Girmay celebrated his victory with a bottle of well shaken prosecco. Sadly his enthusiastic efforts saw the cork fire out of the bottle and straight into his unsuspecting peeper.
The Eritrean cyclist (and as stated earlier we’re not sure that’s a real country) was taken to hospital where he was told to blink for two hours until the offending cork came out – upon which it was humanely destroyed.
A corking result?
In true Marc Marquez eye-injury style Biniam was forced to withdraw from the next stage due to the iris-based incident…all of which could have been the most elaborate way to dodge a drugs test ever.
One in the eye?
So has Girmay’s corking injury out-Marquez’d Marquez? Or does the cyclist from Eritrean (once again, we must stress that we’re really not convinced this country is real) still have a long way to go before he can out-blur the Spaniard?