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Ben Hogan
Born
Golf. In February 1949 Hogan's car was hit head-on by a bus, leaving him with a fractured pelvis, collarbone and ankle, and doctors doubted he would walk normally again. Sixteen months later he won the 1950 US Open at Merion in a play-off, and in 1953 he won the Masters, the US Open and, on his only appearance, the Open Championship at Carnoustie.
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Niki Lauda
Born
Formula One. Lauda suffered severe burns and lung damage when his Ferrari crashed and caught fire at the Nürburgring in August 1976, and was given the last rites in hospital. He raced again six weeks later at Monza, finishing fourth, lost that season's title by a single point, then won the championship in 1977 and again in 1984 with McLaren.
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Monica Seles
Tennis. Seles was world number one with eight Grand Slam titles when she was stabbed in the back by a spectator during a match in Hamburg in April 1993. She did not play on tour again for more than two years, then on her return in 1995 won the Canadian Open, reached the US Open final and in January 1996 won the Australian Open, her ninth major.
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Ronaldo (Brazilian footballer)
Football, Brazil and Inter. Ronaldo ruptured a knee tendon playing for Inter in November 1999, then ruptured it completely on his comeback in April 2000, and played very little for almost two years. He returned for the 2002 World Cup and finished as top scorer with eight goals, including both in the final against Germany, and won the Ballon d'Or that year.
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Hermann Maier
Born
Alpine skiing, Austria. Maier, already a double Olympic champion, was hit by a car while riding his motorcycle in August 2001 and badly broke his right leg, and amputation was considered. He missed the whole 2001–02 season, returned in January 2003 to win the super-G at Kitzbühel, and in 2004 won his fourth overall World Cup title.
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Alex Zanardi
Born
Motor racing and para-cycling, Italy. Zanardi, a two-time CART champion, lost both legs in a crash at the Lausitzring in Germany in September 2001. He returned to racing in adapted cars and won touring car races, then took up handcycling and won four Paralympic gold medals, two in London in 2012 and two in Rio in 2016, as well as several world titles.
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Bethany Hamilton
Surfing, United States. Hamilton lost her left arm in a shark attack off Kauai in October 2003, at the age of 13. She was back in the water within weeks, won a national title in 2005 and went on to compete professionally, including a third place at the 2016 Fiji Pro, a championship tour event where she beat reigning and former world champions.
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Petr Čech
Born
Football, Chelsea and the Czech Republic. Čech suffered a depressed skull fracture in a collision with Reading's Stephen Hunt in October 2006 and needed surgery. He returned three months later wearing a padded headguard, which he kept for the rest of his career, and went on to win the Champions League in 2012, four Premier League titles in all and a record number of Premier League clean sheets.
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Tom Brady
American football, New England Patriots and Tampa Bay Buccaneers. Brady tore the anterior cruciate and medial collateral ligaments in his left knee in the first game of the 2008 season and missed the rest of the year. He came back to win the league MVP award unanimously in 2010 and four more Super Bowls after the injury, the last with Tampa Bay at the age of 43.
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Pat Cummins
Born
Cricket, Australia. Cummins took six wickets on his Test debut in 2011 at 18, then a series of back stress fractures and other injuries kept him out of Test cricket for more than five years. Since returning in 2017 he has become the top-ranked Test bowler and Australia's captain, leading them to the World Test Championship and the 2023 World Cup.
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Peyton Manning
American football, Indianapolis Colts and Denver Broncos. Manning had several neck operations and missed the whole 2011 season, after which Indianapolis released him. With Denver he threw a then-record 55 touchdown passes in 2013, won his fifth MVP award that season, and finished his career by winning Super Bowl 50.
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Adrian Peterson
Born
American football, Minnesota Vikings. Peterson tore the anterior cruciate and medial collateral ligaments in his left knee on 24 December 2011. Playing in the opening game of the next season, he ran for 2,097 yards in 2012, eight yards short of the single-season record, and was named the league's most valuable player.
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Paul George
Basketball, Indiana Pacers and others. George suffered an open fracture of the tibia and fibula in his right leg when he landed on the base of a basket support during a Team USA scrimmage in August 2014. He returned late the following season, won Olympic gold with the United States in 2016, and was named to the All-NBA teams several times after the injury, finishing third in MVP voting in 2019.
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Juan Martín del Potro
Born
Tennis, Argentina. Del Potro, the 2009 US Open champion, had three operations on his left wrist in 2014 and 2015 and fell outside the top 1,000 in the rankings. He returned to beat Novak Djokovic and Rafael Nadal on the way to Olympic silver in Rio in 2016, helped Argentina win its first Davis Cup that year, and in 2018 reached the US Open final and a career-high ranking of world number three.
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Tiger Woods
Golf. Woods had four back operations between 2014 and 2017, the last a spinal fusion in April 2017, and dropped outside the top 1,000 in the world rankings. He won the Tour Championship in September 2018, his first win in five years, and the Masters in April 2019, his 15th major title and first for eleven years.
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Remco Evenepoel
Born
Road cycling, Belgium. Evenepoel fractured his pelvis and bruised a lung when he crashed over a bridge wall into a ravine during Il Lombardia in August 2020, aged 20, and did not race again for nine months. In 2022 he won the Vuelta a España and the world road race title, and at the 2024 Paris Olympics he won both the road race and the time trial.
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Virgil van Dijk
Born
Football, Liverpool and the Netherlands. Van Dijk ruptured the anterior cruciate ligament in his right knee after a challenge from Everton goalkeeper Jordan Pickford in October 2020 and missed the rest of the season. He returned to win both domestic cups with Liverpool in 2022, reach that year's Champions League final, and captain the club to the 2025 Premier League title.
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Marc Márquez
Born
MotoGP, Spain. Márquez, already a six-time premier-class champion, broke his right upper arm in a crash at the opening race of 2020 and needed four operations over the next two years, during which he won only occasionally. After leaving Honda he returned to the front with Ducati and won the 2025 MotoGP world title, his seventh in the premier class.
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Rafael Nadal
Born
Tennis, Spain. Nadal ended his 2021 season in August because of a chronic foot condition, Müller-Weiss syndrome, first diagnosed in 2005, and said he was unsure whether he would play again. On his return in January 2022 he won the Australian Open, then the French Open that June, taking his Grand Slam total to 22.
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Mikaela Shiffrin
Born
Alpine skiing, United States. Shiffrin suffered a deep puncture wound to her abdomen in a crash during a giant slalom at Killington in November 2024 and needed surgery. She returned to racing two months later and in February 2025 won the slalom at Sestriere for her 100th World Cup victory, a number no other alpine skier has reached.
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