Vermeulen knee operation a success

Australia's world superbike rider Chris Vermeulen has undergone surgery on his injured right knee in Barcelona.

The Queenslander, who had already declared that his season was over with four rounds to go, underwent keyhole surgery to repair the two of the three damaged ligaments (posterior and medial), providing the stability in the knee that has been such a problem for him over the last few months.

"The operation lasted for two-and-a-half hours, but it was supposed to
be shorter than that," said Vermeulen. "They found more damage in there
than they thought they would after looking at the scans. But they went
in there and fixed it, it is all reconstructed now and on Friday I
should get my stitches out. I am not allowed to bend it or put any
weight on it for three weeks.

"The idea was to make sure the healing process would be permanent, so
that's why we stopped and fixed everything that was wrong in there. The
physiotherapy should be quite hard and intense when it starts, but
hopefully I will have a knee that will be as good as it was before the
crash."

Chris has been suffering with the injury since the opening round of this year's superbike title at Phillip Island (pictured), and is relieved to finally have a plan of action to ensure a return to full fitness in time for the 2011 Kawasaki race program.

Japanese veteran Akira Yanagawa will replace Vermeulen for this weekend's Silverstone round of the championship. An announcement will follow regarding who will be his replacement for the final three rounds.

Vermeulen was due to to start testing the all-new ZX-10R superbike in the next month, but that has obviously now been put on ice.