Ignacio (Iggy) Silva (Wonderful Pistachios) is currently recovering from a concussion, fractured skull and broken collarbone after crashing at the San Diego velodrome last Thursday. The 21-year-old underwent surgery to reduce swelling in his brain, and according to the blog "Iggy Silva's Road to Recovery" started by Silva's friend Joe Steinberger, his prognoses for a complete recovery is good.
"We have been told that the typical recovery time for a fractured skull is 6-8 weeks. Iggy will likely be in the hospital for the next week or so," Steinberger reports.
The injury has left him confused but Silva has been able to recognize his visiting friends.
"We were pleased that he remembered my name and that I was just there with him," writes Joe. "He still had his moments where he was not able to completely understand what we were saying to him, or he struggled to get the right words out to complete his sentences."
According to the blog, Silva has been making daily improvements in his cognitive ability. A speech therapist has started to work with Silva taking him through exercises that connect commands with an action to perform such as "put on your sock" or "stick out your tongue."
A San Diego native, Silva started racing on the concrete velodrome in Balboa Park at just eight-years of age. He quickly found success in the junior ranks and in 2006 was the national criterium champion, as well as omnium champion on the track. He has represented the national team on the velodrome in the world championships.
It was these results that caught the eye of the Trek-Livestrong U23 team and in 2010 he became a member of the Lance Armstrong owned squad. The U23 team was considered a feeder to the RadioShack team with several of Silva's former teammates making the jump to a ProTour team.
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In 2011, Silva signed with Wonderful Pistachios – a California based team whose focus is the National Racing Calendar. This past October, while riding for his new team, Silva was third in the Elite Track Championships in the points race.
Silva, a freshman at Lees-McRae College in Banner Elk, North Carolina, won a national champion's jersey for his college in the points race at the recent Collegiate Track Nationals. This victory helped Lees-McRae secure fourth place overall in the team omnium, the school's best performance on the track since 2008.
