I climbed into the car with three friends. I woke in hospital to find I’d lost them all – and my legs

Pike in Glasgow in July for the Commonwealth Games. He is head coach for the Australian women’s 3x3 wheelchair basketball team, who took the bronze medal. Photograph: Jeremy Sutton-Hibbert/The Guardian

After the car stopped rolling and came to rest on its side, Rob Pike remembers being “hyperfixated” on the rainwater pouring down his face. When he tried to wipe it away with his arm, he realised it wasn’t water. “I look at my arm and it is covered in blood. The next moment, it hit me: oh my gosh, we crashed.”

He was in the back seat next to his best friend, Daniel McCoy. “I look up to my left to see if Daniel’s OK. He’s probably about a foot away from my face and … he’s not OK. I’m looking at my dead best friend and I wish that wasn’t my last memory of him, seeing how broken he was.” They were 17.