Sometimes, it takes a motorcycle accident and a severed leg to change a life.

Before his accident in 2009, Levi Kane said he was a directionless soul with destructive habits. Now, he is going to participate in the Paratriathalon World Championships in England on Sept. 13.

No big deal.

The motorcycle accident was gruesome. He had been underage drinking at a sports bar in Greenwood and -- not wasted but not sober -- got on his motorcycle and went speeding at up to 80 miles per hour northbound on Greenwood Ave N. He crashed head-on into an oncoming car that was turning left.

His left leg was instantly severed at the knee, flying up and landing on the hood of the car. He broke both femurs. Had a compound fracture of his right humorous. Broke his left clavicle and the bone behind his ear. Bruised his lungs. Lacerated his spleen. Had his left arm torn up by road rash. And he still has the scars from the glass that slashed up his neck.

If it were not for the fast-acting Ballard High School sports trainer who happened to live nearby and wrapped a tourniquet around Kane’s leg, stopped bleeding on his arm with a towel and opened up his airway, Kane would be dead today. Doctors said he was sixty seconds away from bleeding out.

But he didn’t bleed out. He’s not dead. He’s more alive than ever.

“It was kind of an eye opener, how short and precious life is really,” he said.

After making through the motions in court, Kane -- at the time a lifelong Ballard resident who went to Adams Elementary, Whitman Middle School and graduated from Ballard High School in 2007 -- packed up his stuff and moved to Chicago.

In Chicago, a place he had never been before, he started getting stuff done. He went to and graduated from city college and is now going to start at the University of Illionois for a degree in kinesiology. He started running and participated in his first 5k with a loaner leg from his prosthetist.

“Before the accident I only ran for a month -- I was like, oh yeah, I’m a runner now! -- then I don’t run for three years,” he said. “I go out and run my first ever 5k in my life and I ran it in 35 minutes.”

Not satisfied with a mediocre finish, he set his goals high. He said he wanted to beat Melissa Stockwell, a U.S. Army veteran and perhaps the most iconic amputee athlete today. Stockwell lost her left leg when a roadside bomb exploded while she was leading a convoy in Baghdad. Now she is a three-time paratriathalon world championship winner and inspiration to amputees all over the world.

On Dec. 1, 2012, Kane beat Stockwell by two or three minutes in the Santa Hustle 5k. The next day, she told Kane that he would make “one hell of a triathalete.”

“She said, ‘Are you in?’ and I said, ‘I’m in like Flynn,’ and I’ve been going at it hard ever since. It’s been great. … at the end it’s the most satisfying thing in the world,” Kane said. Then, reflecting, he stressed, “The most satisfying thing in the world.”

With an advanced runner’s leg and bicycle loaned to him by Stockwell and after six months of grueling hard training, Kane -- who had hardly ever ran before, who never really swam or bicycled -- got in second place in the Paratriathalon National Championships in Austin.

“Dude, to get second I was like, are you shitting me? I thought someone was playing a joke on me,” he said. “It was huge! I just couldn’t believe it.”

Now, Kane is going to the World Championships in London, but first he has to raise money. While he has the will, he doesn't necessarily have the means. He said he needs to pay for a plane ticket, accommodations, an official U.S. jersey, a bicycle that fits him (the one he’s borrowing is too tall for him) and the pricetag to enter. To donate, visit www.oneleggedlevi.com and click on the yellow donate button, or email him at oneleggedlevi@yahoo.com about sponsorship opportunities.

Of course, Kane doesn’t plan to stop at the world championships. He hopes to represent the U.S. in the Para-Olympics in Rio de Janeiro in the summer of 2016.

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