Kalle Palander

Kalle Palander THE FINNISH newspaper Helsingin Sanomat is reporting that 1999 slalom World Champion and 2003 World Cup slalom champ Kalle Palander won't return to the circuit until well after the New Year and perhaps not until next season because of a slow healing stress fracture in his lower leg. The 31-year-old Palander said at a press conference Thursday he was annoyed that the stress fracture he had surgery to fix in February had not healed as well as expected and added that he wanted to return to the race hill as quickly as possible. "My career is far from over. And when I do come back it will surely be noticed," Palander says. Finnish national team surgeon Eero Hyvärinen performed the operation on Palander's shin in February, and it apparently was healing well until a month ago when Palander felt pain in his leg and momentarily lost balance while training in Argentina.
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"I did not even bother to try to get to the slopes," Palander says. His shin was then X-rayed in Finland.
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Palander will undergo another surgical procedure where a steel rod will be inserted through a hole next to the knee into the bone marrow cavity of the tibia and pushed all the way down to the ankle. In a previous operation a titanium plate had been inserted to support Palander's shin but that will be removed. "In February, I used the metal plate in order to avoid irritating Kalle's knee that has also bothered him for years.
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Palander says he intends to return and compete in the 2010 Olympic Games. "The Olympic Games are 18 months away. There, I intend to be the one to beat," he says.