Warning: this article contains content some may find upsetting
For the first time, Freddie Flintoff has opened up in incredible detail about the Top Gear crash that almost killed him.
Back in December 2022, the former England all-rounder was driving around the show's famous race track for what appeared to be a run of the mill segment.
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But while Freddie and his family had been nervous about some of the previous stunts he'd thrown himself into - quite literally in some cases - for the sake of entertainment, they thought nothing of him taking a spin in a three-wheeler.
However, in his incredibly powerful new documentary, Flintoff, the 47-year-old finally opens up about that fateful day and how it changed his life forever.
Recalling the crash, Flintoff admitted that he can remember it all in vivid detail to this day.
"In some ways it would have been easier if I’d gone unconscious and then been unconscious for a week or two, and then you wake up and your stitches are out and everything, but I remember everything," he says.
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"We were probably doing about 40/45mph, they were showing me how to get the car going sideways, and the wheel came off.
"It’s a funny thing rolling a car, the point of no return - and everything slows down, it’s so weird."
Weirdly, the terrifying incident took him back to his career as a cricketer, where he made his name and became a national hero and icon.
Freddie goes on: "I'm sure it’ll get questioned by people but I used to play cricket, I used to bat; you get 0.4 of a second to make your mind up where the ball’s going, what shot you’re gonna play, how you’re gonna move your feet, and as it started going over, I looked at the ground and I knew if I get hit here on this side, then I break my neck, or if I get hit on the temple, I’m dead. My best chance is go face down.
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"And I remember hitting, and then my head got hit, but then I got dragged out and the car went over and I went over the back of the car, and then pulled face down on the runway for about 50m underneath the car, and then it hit the grass and I flipped back in."
For the next few moments, Freddie says he wasn't sure if he was dead or alive.
He goes on: "My biggest fear was, I didn’t think I had a face. I thought my face had come off. I was frightened to death."
Freddie then spent the best part of an hour in unbearable agony as he waited for an air ambulance to arrive and take him to St George's Hospital, where surgeons acted quickly to piece him back together.
Speaking in the documentary, Mr Jahrad Haq admits that Freddie's injuries were among the most severe he had ever dealt with in his career, with the father-of-four having lost a significant amount of hard and soft tissue, with damage to his jaw, teeth, lips and nose.
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The film, which lands on Disney+ tomorrow (25 April), follows Freddie's long road to recovery, from taking refuge in his Cheshire home in the days and months after the crash to finally returning to his safe space, cricket.
Speaking at a Q&A for the doc, Freddie said he was thankful the sport had welcomed him back into its arms in his hour of need.
"It [cricket[ probably saved me. I've been welcomed back into that fold and I'm loving it, to be honest with you. I've got the opportunity now to coach. Who'd have thought a 31-year-old me would be put in charge of kids, the next best England players, and I absolutely love it, so foe everything that's happened, I think sport is the one thing that's given me the coping mechanisms to get through pretty much anything, because some of the lows in cricket are so low, and you've got to come back, it was resilience, it was passion, surrounded by people you love and people you trust, it was probably one of the most important things in my life after my family and my friends.
Topics: UK News, Top Gear, Freddie Flintoff, Documentaries, Disney Plus, TV and Film, Health
Dominic Smithers