Three years ago, Alexa Leary’s parents said goodbye to their daughter. The 19-year-old triathlete – a silver medallist at the 2019 world junior titles – had fallen off her bike while training at about 70km/h and landed on her head.
Her father Russ, who was also on the Saturday morning ride just outside Noosa, hardly recognised his unconscious daughter. Along with broken ribs, skull and scapula, she also had a punctured lung and shattered leg.
She was airlifted to Royal Brisbane and Women’s Hospital and immediately sent for emergency surgery. Part of her skull had to be removed or death would have been unavoidable. So Russ and his wife Belinda waited and endured, not knowing if Leary would ever come back to them.
She did – more than once. During her stay in the intensive care unit, …