SSAP 2017....the year
So as I sit here with my left arm in a cast and my right eye swollen closed...I supposed I could be depressed and upset...I have no idea how long it will be until I can ride again and in 8 years of riding I have never injured myself bad enough that I need more than a few days off. This is uncharted territory for me since my MX days. But its all good...Shit happens...when something like this happens, its good to stop and say...Something positive will come from it...Who knows what, but something...Since my father died, I have tried to live my life with this philosophy.
So lets take a ride and figure out what the hell went wrong.
The last two weeks I have been completely tuned out of biking. On may 1st I received an offer from another company and I decided to take it....This is a major event in my life after ten years at my company...Ill post more about that another time, but I have really been out of it lately focus wise. However, I got the new scalpel set up SS and it was working great. The dual lockout while annoying with gears...on an SS it was money.
So yesterday I head out to do my pre race ride and of course this POS lock out lever breaks...THankfully it broke with the suspension open...But I decided to give my buddy Yukon at martys a call to see if he could rebleed it and get it working again..He calls me ayt 4pm to say it was broken and the shocks we now totally locked...Lot of stress and fucking with it later, he got it to unlock again. This lever set up, like most things rockshox makes is trash, so im not surprised. The nanosecond fox starts shipping its metric shocks, im ditching this thing
Lettuce get to the race. Good news, same course as last year...I generally liked it minus Buchanan hill, but whatever, its over quick...The first 30min is stupid fast and alot of pain. No adam craig this year, nut his buddy carl decker signed up, so I figured he would be the man to beat - on us
Met Iggy and DnD and we drive up..Looking around...um no Carl Decker, no monte, no leo...Hmm ok...Of course Matt Green, Ross, Will crissman, Rob Price are all beasts so I know this day is still going to be tough. But unlike when Adam shows up...im thinking...hey this might work out today.
We roll out, usual party down the fire road until schofield where I turn in 3rd behind Will and Ross...Will sets a nice pace and unlike in years past, we come out on the other side with a few more people still in tow than last year. We coast down the flat road to the next big hill...chit chatting and making jokes... Then we hit the road climb...I turn it up just enough to hold the lead up the climb then roll back to 4th for bucanan...I try to not go nuts here...I like to save the big efforts for the fast single track where I can use my knowledge of the park to my advantage. However, this climb is 6 min where im almost entirely out of the saddle....This year it was dry enough to climb and we all made it....I watched my HR climb to 179 as I mashed my way to the top...It was a brutal effort. Man this section blows.
We get out of that and im still in good shape, I stick in 4th until weed road where we regroup a bit...its not Matt, me, Ross, Will, Rob price and another dude in a b2c2 kit. Rob asks me "has anyone gotten away?" I said nope...were on the rev limiter, theres no where to go.
Major mike is where this ends and you can really start making time on people. Mattm Ross me as we grind up the hill, hit the top, I say hi to
@gtluke then get ready for the downhill. I know Matt is a very good downhiller and in short order he is gapping Ross...Near the bottom maybe its 10-15sec...I said to ross, follow me through camp...I WILL run him down. We hit the bottom, ross lets me by and I turn pace to 10, 11, 12, 873....Like matt, you are NOT getting away, no chance was going though my head. There is a rise in camp about 45 sec in, steep drop on the back side...Followed byt a hard right hander. Usually I loft the bike down the hill and land near the bottom of the downside than flip the bike though the turn, its like one motion, all of it. I have done it countless time in the past 8 years....HOWEVER
I hit going really fast, as im in the air I realized that I am going to overshoot the landing....Im preparing to land nose down on the downside of the jump....But now im landing nose down on the flat...I SLAMMED down really hard...hard enough to rip my feet off my pedals and slam my body into the bike...I stayed with it and just went for the brake with the right hander coming...I knew I could not make the turn and the EJECT EJECT EJECT warning sounded in my brain. I saw this big tree coming up and I tried to lean to my right to miss it....thats the last I remember...Usually I remember the impact, but I dont this time.
Next I remember Ross and Will are helping me...and what seemed like moments later
@Chris26er and
@David Taylor were there also. I was super dizzy, the damage to my face did not occur to me until other ride started coming by going "HOLY FUCKING FUCK UTAH". After what felt like a few minutes, the emt on the quad was there to drag me out..Then we met up with race in the woods where I hopped into his truck. and he took me out to the amberlamps waiting on weed road.
I got in and asked the nice medics if the could drive me to Morristown...they laughed...@missjr was nice enough to fetch my phone out of my car for me and someone got in touch with my wife. On the way I call my wife...I tell her im totally fine, few lacs that need stiches, but nothing to worry about...stay home, take car of bob and ill have one of my friends take me home. My wife then talks to the medic in some medical jargon...the medic tells her im lying and that I might have fractured my orbit...they are taking me to the trama unit. So with that, my wife is now coming with bob...Joy. the medic took this pic of me to send to my wife... I told him to send it to my coach
@Norm ...Norms last words to me this morning were: win, or just dont both coming home.
So they wheel me in through the front doors...the patients sitting there look as if they just saw the human centipede..Mother puts a blanket over her daughters head so she cant see me lol... Into the trama unit and like 7 people are poking me etc....xrays, cat scans, the whole 9. I beg them not too but they cut off my favorite kit with Schillings logo on my shoulder..Good news is that my brain is ok...no skull fractures...BUT non displaced distal radial fracture....so my radius is cracked, not badly but cracked. This was disappointing.
Next the doc goes to work on my cuts, 5 of them need stitches, worse on was from my riding glasses slicing into cheek. Holy crap, I have had stitches everywhere but not my face...that stung. As the doc is knitting, in comes my wife with Bob in tow. Bob gets one look at my face and nearly shits himself and starts crying...I assure him that im fine...I used to love the comfort my father gave me as a child that no matter what...He was impervious to pain...Burns, cuts, whatever...you ok Dad....Of course im ok...your father is constructed of stainless steel, nothing can hurt me! But watching him be upset and cry was the worst part of this day. I eventually got through to him and said "dont I look like a pirate" this chilled him out.
So after my stitches and alot of waiting we head home.
I have to say the outpouring on concern for me has been wonderful, I really apericate it. I also wanted to again thank Ross, Will, Chris and DT for stopping and helping me out...You know we work very hard training for these races...Its months of hard work in my case anyway...to have opportunity to win this race, but then toss it to help an injured rider...It says alot about the kind of people who are in this sport and makes me glad to be a part of it.
Ok thats all I got tonight...