Brain injury survivor Young shredded, leading category in Mr. Health and Fitness Competition

He was well on his way to becoming a firefighter when his life changed on Friday, Oct. 13, 2017. 

Young said he was driving home from a shift working on a tugboat on Adams Lake when his vehicle hit a patch of black ice. 

“I crossed the centre line and stalled perpendicular to oncoming traffic,” Young said, noting his car was hit by an F150. “I remember headlights coming at my driver’s door, I remember contact and then I remember waking up in the hospital weeks after the fact. I’d collapsed my lungs and knocked my teeth out. I bit my tongue in half.” 

Recovery began after a 12-day coma, with a brain injury among the long list of ailments. 

“I wake up from a coma in the middle of a firefighting pursuit and it really fuelled my recovery,” Young said. 

“I had to learn how to walk again and there was extensive physiotherapy and vision therapy and I sought rehab assistance and I saw a speech pathologist. I just kept it moving.” 

Young’s road to recovery has been more literal than others. 

He lived and travelled in a van – Rory’s Vansion – and published tales from the road on his YouTube channel, along with videos of some of his workouts. 

“It’s an invisible injury and my struggles are pretty quiet,” Young said, noting the videos kept his family and friends informed and entertained. “If I don’t say something about it, nobody really knows.”   

Young, who was drafted by the Houston Astros in Round 39 of the 2009 Major League Baseball Draft, said his recovery has been spurred by the Kamloops Brain Injury Association. 

“I can’t believe how helpful it’s been,” Young said. “I didn’t think I needed any help in the world and then I came here on a whim with my mom, who was going to a survivors’ meeting. Everything has changed since then. Everything’s been moving in the right direction and it’s moving a lot faster, that’s for sure.”    

Young remains in pursuit of a career in firefighting – his goal to land a job with Kamloops Fire Rescue – and recently completed training with help from a Gur Singh provincial grant. 

Donations and votes for the Mr. Health and Fitness Competition – a fundraiser for child cancer research – are accepted online. 

Young is in first place in his category, with the first round of voting slated to close on Thursday.

“In this new life I’ve got with this brain injury, I think the best thing I can is inspire and this is a good opportunity to do that,” Young said, noting he is working out strenuously nearly every day. “I hope that I can inspire fitness and movement for everybody and not just brain injury survivors.”