COMMONWEALTH Games medallist Stephanie Inglis has admitted defeat in her bid to return to competitive judo as she continues her recovery from a horrific motorbike crash in Vietnam.
The 28-year-old was initially given just a one per cent chance of survival from serious head and neck injuries in the road accident last year.
A crowdfunding campaign raised money to cover the cost of treatment in Thailand and her return to Scotland, where she woke up from a coma in a hospital in Edinburgh, six weeks after the crash.
Inglis, from Daviot, near Inverness, had to learn to walk again but made a remarkable physical recovery and had targeted a return to judo, where she won a silver medal at the Glasgow 2014 Commonwealth Games. However, with doctors telling her any head knock in judo could risk her life, Inglis has admitted she will not compete again.
She told BBC Radio Scotland: “I’m struggling to come to terms with it and it’s probably affecting my mental state on top of everything else. I’d always been hopeful I could return to the mat.
“It’s not something I’m choosing to put an end to but my surgeons just highly recommend it’s not the best thing, it’s life threatening if I did re-injure the head.
“At the end of the day, judo is just a sport, I mean it’s been everything to me but I’ve got my whole future ahead of me, and I’m very lucky for that.
“I’m slowly coming to terms with that door maybe being closed in my life.”
Inglis added she “still has a lot to give to the sport” and admitted she will “be in a better position to help others and coach the future talent in the Highlands”.
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