A GoFundMe page has been set up to help cover the significant ongoing medical expenses of Chris Overkamp, the Buffalo, N.Y.-area performance-boat owner who was seriously injured when his 30-foot outboard engine-powered catamaran rolled during the Buffalo Poker Run in early August. In addition to a traumatic brain injury, the 42-year-old marina owner of Bow and Stern Marine, Inc., in North Tonawanda, N.Y., sustained four broken ribs, a broken shoulder and clavicle and a torn ACL in the solo-boat accident.

A member of the Western New York Offshore Powerboat Association, Overkamp is a well known member of the area’s performance-boating community.

The road to recovery will be long and costly for Overkamp, shown here with friends in his 30-foot Spectre catamaran during the 2015 Buffalo Poker Run. Photo courtesy/copyright Tim Sharkey/Sharkey Images.

Overkamp returned home from the hospital on Friday. While his physicians, family and friends are hoping he will fully recovery from his brain injury, complete recovery is not guaranteed. In addition to around-the-clock care seven days a week, Overkamp will require extensive outpatient therapy.

“There’s no answer in terms of what his recovery will be,” said his wife, Nicole Overkamp, who also was in the crash but escaped uninjured and helped rescue her husband. “We’re trying to figure it all out. The doctors have said it will be six months to a year, but we don’t know what it (the extent of the recovery) will be. He’s speaking and he’s walking with assistance, but he’s also confused and agitated.

“He’s doing a lot better,” she continued. “It just sucks not to have my husband. It’s one of those nightmares you never expect to live.”

According to Nicole Overkamp, friends and family are stepping up to augment her husband’s full-time at-home caregivers. Her business partner set up the GoFundMe page.

“We have tremendous support from friends and family who’ll be with Chris,” she said. “We’ll figure it out. We are very blessed to have amazing people helping out. I can’t even begin to show how grateful I am for how supportive everyone has been. I know Chris would say the same thing.

“He’s as strong as can be,” she added then laughed. “He’s actually talking about getting a new boat.”

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