The 23-year-old had a freak accident during training at Mt Buller on Friday morning, which has ruptured his ACL.
“Quite the mogul I have to deal with. Now it’s time to adjust the game plan, get my knee back to feeling strong and hit the gym harder than I ever have before,” Summers said.
“I’m feeling very fortunate to have a team that is so well set up to deal with these sort of things. The plan is to have a MRI on Monday morning and then head straight to Doc Braun. Then I will have a better idea about where to go from here and time frames,” Summers said.
On-site at Mt Buller was OWIA Head of Rehab Ashley Merkur.
“I had Ash with me at Mt Buller. She broke the news to me straight away that she thought it was a torn ACL and called Doc. They’ve set up a course of action. It’s not a great situation to be in but it’s great tp have the support around me.”
Five months out from PyeongChang, he admits “it’s tight”.
“I’m getting through it mentally. We will know more on Monday.”
“Whatever the situation I’m already motivated to give it every bit I’ve got to get the job done. Other people have done it,” he said.
The Melbourne local competed in the Australian Championships in Perisher last week, where he finished fourth behind the Canadian trio Mikael Kingsbury (currently ranked first in the world), Marc Antoine Gagnon and Gabriel Dufresne and was back at Mt Buller for training.
He had planned to defend his prestigious ABOM Moguls Challenge title, which he won for the second time in 2016 alongside his Australian teammate, the current female World Champion and five-time ABOM Champion Britt Cox.
“It’s the longest running FIS mogul event in the world I believe,” Summers said. “And it has a great heritage with former champions including Dale Begg-Smith and Alexandre Bilodeau.
Defending that title is now off the table, but his sights remain on PyeongChang.
“The Olympics is the pinnacle of our sport so getting another opportunity to represent Australia at this level is an absolute privilege.
“Every time I think about PyeongChang it just reminds me that I can’t afford to waste a day at training,” he said last week.
“Whether it’s on the hill, in the gym or even at home when I’m working on the mental aspects of my training, it’s always in my mind that the Games are fast approaching and I need to make every day at training count.”