Guy Fieri is recovering from an on-set injury this Thanksgiving.
The Food Network star has revealed that he is currently in a wheelchair and on crutches after tearing his quad muscle in half when he fell down the stairs while filming his new show Flavor Town Food Fight.
“[I] slipped down a set of steps and one foot went forward and the other foot got caught on the threshold. So, you know, it extended me out,” Fieri told Fox News’ website. “I looked like I was probably doing the splits, but when my right leg compressed into itself the giveaway point and the doctor said he’s never seen — you know, in 20 years — he hasn’t seen a tear in the biggest, thickest part of your quad in half. Yeah, it sucked.”
He added, “You normally tear that muscle at your tendon or the tendon tears off the bone, but this was right in the center of the whole quad muscle and it exploded.”
Fieri said he was rushed to surgery, in the middle of filming with chefs and 125 people on set, to make sure his muscles didn’t “recede.”
He explained the medical emergency required some “creative filming techniques” as he and the show’s team “figured out how to pivot through it.”
Now the chef is recovering at his ranch, but his injury has sidelined him from this year’s Thanksgiving feast.
“I’m on crutches and in a wheelchair. I mean, I have to stay off it and the whole thing. I can’t walk on it for eight weeks,” Fieri explained, revealing his sons, Hunter and Ryder, and nephew Jules will take on the cooking duties this year. “So it was funny. My son, Ryder, texted me from school and he said, ‘Well, I guess all the training you’ve given me and all the cooking I’ve been doing while I was at school, it was going to be my time to shine.’ And I said, ‘I am so happy you’re asking me about this versus me telling you, you have to do it,’” Fieri said.
He added, “It’s gonna be me quarterbacking from the wheelchair and telling them what to do. And we cook for about 40 people up here. So it’s going to be, it’s got to be an adventure.”
After his eight weeks on crutches and in a wheelchair, Fieri’s recovery won’t be done as he’ll have to go through rehab, he said, adding that it’s been a long time since he broke one of his bones.
Despite his celebrity status, Fieri told The Hollywood Reporter a few years ago that he’s “not for everybody.”
“You can easily be misinterpreted when you have platinum blond hair and tattoos,” he said. “But I’m not for everybody. I don’t know if anybody is.”
But his son, Hunter, has an explanation for his dad’s success: “That dude just has more energy than anybody I’ve ever met. It is amazing and scary at the same time.”
