Hamm’s focus on medals, not just Beijing
Olympic gold medalist Paul Hamm’s recovery from hand surgery is being accelerated so he’ll be able to contend for a medal at the Beijing Games.
“I’m not getting him ready just to go,” Dr. Lawrence Lubbers said Wednesday. “I want to see a medal. And I want it around his neck.”
Lubbers repaired the broken fourth metacarpal in Hamm’s right hand Tuesday, inserting a thin plate and nine screws to return the bone to its original alignment. The surgery at Riverside Methodist Hospital in Columbus, Ohio, went “very well,” Lubbers said, and the gymnast could be doing resistance exercises within a week.
Hamm hopes to be back on gymnastics equipment in five weeks; the men’s competition in Beijing starts Aug. 9, about 10 1/2 weeks from now.
“He’s been on two Olympic teams already. We don’t just want to make another Olympic team,” said Miles Avery, Hamm’s coach. “We want to get back to the level we were in Houston, good enough to be able to win.”
To do that, Lubbers said he is using every physiological application he can to speed Hamm’s healing. That included taking some of Hamm’s cells that promote bone growth, adding spongy bone material from cadavers and spreading the mixture around the site of the fracture. That should make the break heal even faster.
“Normally we wouldn’t do that. But here in this case we’ve got a very elite athlete, and we’re looking for every possible way to enhance his recovery and strengthen bone healing,” Lubbers said.
“The first phase of treatment went very well, and I’m quite pleased with that,” Lubbers added. “Now we’re down to the hard working part.”
Working hard won’t be an issue for Hamm.
After a fall on vault dropped him to 12th place and seemingly out of contention for any medal at the Athens Olympics, Hamm responded with the two best events of his life to become the first American man to win the all-around gold.
Despite a 2 1/2-year layoff – unheard of in elite gymnastics – he’s been at his best this year. Hamm injured his hand in the final seconds of his parallel bars routine last Thursday, yet still finished preliminaries at the U.S. gymnastics championships with an almost four-point lead.
“We just have a challenge ahead of us. But I think he’s in the overcome challenge mode,” Avery said.
The key in the first few days after surgery is reducing the swelling in Hamm’s hand so he won’t lose range of motion. He’s wearing special compression bandages to help that, and will probably continue to wear a compression glove when the bandages are removed today.
Hamm will begin physical therapy today with range of motion exercises. Resistance work – starting with something like putty – could start next week, Lubbers said.
“We want to prevent muscle atrophy and keep his arm strong and also have it heal fast enough so he can be back training somewhere in the four- to seven-week time frame, hopefully sooner rather than later,” Lubbers said.
Hamm also will be doing conditioning work to keep the rest of his body in shape, and he didn’t waste any time starting on that. He spent several hours in the gym Monday, including doing some strength work on the still rings, and could resume conditioning by Friday or Saturday.
Hamm will do a lot of upper body work and core strength, Avery said. One thing that should help is that Hamm was in the best shape of his life before the injury.
“His routines were very easy for him,” Avery said. “We’ll do a ton of conditioning … so when he is ready, his body is so fit it takes to gymnastics easily.”