Brace For Impact

3, 2, 1...

Last night I was "in charge" of the swim/bike workout on the west side for CTC. Managed to get there on time despite being incredibly swamped at work and we were all in the water and waves by a little after 6.

The lake was choppy, nothing we couldn't handle, but it made it incredibly difficult to spot people and I ended up cutting my swim short to make sure everyone was out of the water. So about 20 minutes and 1200 yards in the lake. I wasn't too worried about it because it would give me more time to try and squeeze in 40 miles instead of just 20 on the bike.

I told everyone to take off on the bikes while I waited for IronJohnny to finish his 1800 yards. MW waited for me and after a pic from B2 MW and I headed out into the night.















MW, Me, and Fiona

It was probably one of the best rides I have ever had. We were cruising easily at 19 mph with the wind at our back and the heat didn't feel too bad. I was riding aero and was pretty comfortable. I thought to myself if Steelhead is more like this and less like the hills of GCT then 6 hours might still be in the cards. And then, about 19 miles into our ride, we literally ran into trouble.

We were headed East away from the sun and into the wind and a Ford Explorer was heading west into the sun and made a left hand turn into an intersection as we were crossing.

MW was leading and unfortunately couldn't avoid the car. I saw her hit the front of the car and roll over the hood. I don't know what I did to avoid the car and her but somehow I did and cruised over the curb and had a bumpy ride in the grass narrowly avoiding a sign and fire hydrant before getting tossed from the bike.

Everything is kind of missing from the point when I saw her hit to the point where I ran to her to find out if she was okay. It is driving me batty that I cannot remember what happened. All I know is somehow I got out of my shoes and ran to her and was so relieved that she was talking and seemed to be able to move despite her head feeling a bit heavy. The cops and paramedics came very quickly. The guy that hit us was very nice, no hit and run or anything. He stuck around and got us his insurance coverage information. The cops charged him with failure to yield. As I was filling out the police report my right hand wasn't quite gripping right and my shoulder was very tight and sore. I remembered after the crash that I had moved my neck and it had popped (like when you crack your back) and I told that to the paramedics and quicker than you could blink they had a neck brace on me and were hauling me off in an ambulance.

I had them take me to the same hospital as MW and we were next to each other while we waited for a doc and x rays. Luckily both of our x rays were good, no broken bones! And we are both okay. MW is pretty beat up and sore and probably had a concussion. I came away with a grass stained shirt and a little abrasion on my elbow. My shoulder is a bit sore today and it is painful to turn my head to the left, but I should recover fine. The doc said to limit lots of arm motion. But he said to go with how I feel. Not training at this stage in the game is a little scary to think about but I will get by with whatever I have done so far if that's what is needed.

Tonight I need to take Fiona (My Giant OCR 2) to get an estimate on the damage done. Hopefully they will fix her up before Sunday so A and I can get in our last long brick before taper.

Huge thanks to everyone in CTC who has already sent out their support to me and MW. What a great team I am involved with! I even got a personal call from the prez checking in on me and making sure that I get Fiona in for a diagnosis. I couldn't ask for more supportive friends and triathletes to be associated with.

I will end this post on a public service announcement.

Wear your helmet and gloves at all times folks! If MW didn't have that helmet on last night things would have been very bad. That helmet probably saved her life. And her hands would have been shredded if she hadn't had on those gloves. Her pinky had a pretty deep abrasion so I can't imagine what the rest of her hands would have looked like if she hadn't worn the gloves.