Brief replay of my crashes: Uphill on Cardiac Hill (somehow flipped over to my back and cracked it on some cinderblock erosion control - which is a smart idea, btw), Full Endo, slow speed (right behind Marty - got caught on a root - gravity was pretty strong in this area - please see Remus' blog for a picture of bike in prone position), Forearm tree smash (caught a bad root dipping into some trenches, got offline and was fortunate enough to bash my right forearm into a 16" dia tree, jamming my shoulder - this one caused Remus to crash as well), High Speed sapling incident (going downhill - probably close to 15mph, again offline, nipping a 1" dia sapling - it got a hold of my handlebar inside my bar end, smashed my pinky and thumb and sent me endo'ing multiple feet. This one crushed my right side ribcage, I feel a deep bruise already, hard to breathe when I stretch - at first I thought I cracked something, but it's probably just a bruise), plus many other minor incidences mainly having to do with roots, sand and overall tiredness. Exercise induced stupidity, I guess.
Regardless of all the pain, one thing is for sure...not too many things in life beats rampaging through the leafy woods in the fall season, in brisk air with two of your best friends. It was a great 3 hours of pain.
Overall, none of us could believe how many times we all crashed. I guess one positive thing to come out of this is that crashing (in my mind) means that you're at least trying to ride harder than you probably should. If you don't crash, you're not going hard enough.
Until next year Fort Custer. I will conquer you yet.
Blood: Nature's skin adhesive.
(I had to leave the blood, so it would hold the skin shavings onto my thumb.)
Actually, I can't remember the last time I've left the grounds of Fort Custer and NOT been bleeding.
This was after I fell (uphill) on Cardiac Climb the second time. Crashed, then fell over and whacked
my back on the cinderblock erosion control you see there.
This fall crushed me down HARD. I endo'ed VERY quickly and went straight down with a thud.
All I could do was lay there motionless. Remus had plenty of time to come back down the trail to snap
this shot of me crippled by the blow. Look how my bike (somehow) landed perfectly on bars and seat.
Here are some of my other activities from this week:
Saturday night (yesterday) I went for a "knee check" ride. High rpms at slow speed to check the stability of my knee (see next post). Everything checked out good, at one point got up to 31 mph on a flat stretch near my house. Fast!
Tuesday Ride: Luton with Remus
Remus came over to ride Luton Park for the first time. As I become increasingly confident on this track, I am getting faster (and braver). Not even 1.5 miles into the ride I skid through a 90 degree (flat) left turn and the bike comes out from under me. Soon after, I realize my left knee is not very stable. It starts to swell and I end up limping very badly the next day. The pain has "torn ACL" written all over it. (Since I've done this twice, I know the feeling.) The pain subsides days later - it still feels unstable - not sure of the actual injury, but it was dumb how it happened. Wish I had at least gone shooting off a cliff or something. Remus crashed while trying to take video of me. I turned around and heard BAM, squeeeel! and man down. Camera face down in the dirt under his hand. The funniest part was watching the look of Remus in panic-mode as a hot chick in full kit almost run him over with her 9'er laughing at his crash.
Anyways, the rest of the ride was not notable for much, except that we rode the trail quickly - quickly enough to ride part of it twice and still have time for a Sam Adams in the parking lot as the sun set and we watched some homos drink wine at the plastic picnic table they set up out of the back of their Suburban.
OH, and this was my first sighting of "Stumpy" (Remus new 29'er Specialized Stumpjumper). I had to dip my bauls on the top tube - it gave me wood I'm pretty sure. I must have one. It is a beautiful machine.
hahahahaha. Was it really that bad? If so I think you're body may be trying to tell you something.......Never get on a mountain bike again. Maybe you could try riding horses.
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