Potholes: 1, Pete: 0
by admin on Aug.11, 2010, under Workouts
I don’t know how many times I’ve ridden down Granville, one of the main bike routes on the northside, and sworn at how bad the potholes were. In fact, they are so bad, I’d never taken my car down the street. When I biked through, I would always slow down and hold on tight.
While heading home from a hot and humid ride on Sunday, I was a little too relaxed on Granville before hitting the really bad section. I was in the far right lane lettings cars pass me. The next thing I know, I was doing an endo over my handlebars and sliding into a parked car. As with most bike crashes, they happen quickly and you put the pieces together afterwards.
I got up swearing knowing that I hit a pothole. I could walk and knew I hadn’t hit by head. I knew that I had bad road rash and my chest was hurting. At first, I thought I had broken ribs, but noticed my forearm was swelling and hurting. I was afraid I had broken my forearm, so I immediately called Rose to pick me up. Luckily, she was home and I was only about 3 miles away. A few motorists were nice and stopped and asked if I needed help.
I was OK to walk around and grabbed my bike, which had escaped significant damage, except the shifters, and walked across the street to a church to wait for Rose. While waiting, I couldn’t believe how many morons on I saw on bikes zip but sans helmets on their racing bikes. Some looked at me banged up and could have easily have wiped out themselves. It’s one thing to wipe out at 5 MPH, it’s another thing to wipe out 20 MPH.
Anyway, Rose was wonderful and took me to the Northwestern ER. I immediately got sent inside due to the speed of the crash. Even with a helmet, there is a risk of severe trauma at “high” speeds. Thankfully, I was in decent shape, except that I was sure I had broken something. The staff in the ER was wonderful. Amazingly, my x-rays showed no signs of fractures, so they sent me home in a splint. I had been in severe pain and happy to get hydromorphone and hydrocodone.
I didn’t see the hand MD until today and he thinks that I “just” have a wrist sprain and mallet finger in my pinky. Still sucks, but better than what I had thought. I’m not in that much pain and can actually type with both hands right now. Will be interesting to see how things go over the next few weeks. Won’t be biking outside for a few weeks, but happy this happened at the end of the road season. Interestingly, I feel more sore from the crash like you would after a car crash. Not fun, but any crash you can walk away from can’t be too bad. Here are a few photos.
BTW, I nearly got run over while walking home from the bus stop today. Makes me wonder if we weren’t safer before the wheel was intented. Of course, back then, we might have gotten eaten by sabre tooth tigers. And, they didn’t have X-rays or MRIs…:)
Photo of me in ER…smile thanks to the hydromorphone and Rose being silly.
Where I crashed on Granville, just past Clark. The “smooth” section before all of the potholes.
Too bad you can’t see them from space…yet.
Hi, Dad!
by admin on Aug.07, 2010, under Cycling, Reports and Results, Time Trial
Wisconsin State TT Championship – 40K
August 7, 2010 – Brighton, WI
Masters 35-39 – 4th – 56:31
269 watts – 26.4 MPH
The Wisconsin State TT championship was a little weird for me for a couple of reasons. First, I never had completed the race, despite trying twice. The first time I ended up with a flat tire with no spare, no I never started. The second time, I broke my collarbone after the first lap. Thus, I was obviously a little nervous for the race this year because of the bad luck I had had in the past. The other reason I felt weird was that my dad was coming to watch. That’s not bad. It’s just that he hadn’t seen me in a race since college (and never in a bike race).
The “world famous” Bong course was used for this 40K TT, so I was well familiar with it (we only race about 3-4 times per year). There weren’t many riders preregistered, but there were plenty on the day of the race. I went through my normal prerace routine and opted to go without water ( temps were in the low-70s). I never used water in running races under 1 hour in these conditions, so I decided to try the same practice in biking.
With little wind, my main goal was to have a first lap faster than my Bong races from earlier in the year, then push it as much as I could the second lap. I ended up about 10-15 seconds faster on my first lap than earlier in the year, so I was pretty excited. I started to hurt the second lap from the lack of water, but I didn’t bonk. My second lap was a little slower, but I ended up annihilating my best Bong 40K course time by over 1:30.
It wasn’t my fastest race of the year, but one of the most gratifying. I’ve never been that fast on this course, and I crossed the finish line totally spent. I got back to the parking lot to find my dad. He had shown up in time to take some photos of me finishing, which you can see below. I was hoping to finish Top 3, but was still happy with my performance and it was great seeing my dad at a race.
Mastering Shorter Distances
by admin on Aug.05, 2010, under Cycling, Reports and Results, Time Trial
Bryce Master 19K TT
July 31, 2010 – Harvard, IL
Masters 30+ – 4th – 26:57.95
283 watts – 26.2 MPH
The Bryce Master TT is always a complete shock to the system after a couple months of 30K-50K TTs. It used to be a 30K race itself, but was shortened to just 19K a couple of years ago. Wow. Does it ever feel weird having to rev up the pace after you’ve been so focused on pacing for longer distances.
Interestingly, my training lately had prepped me for these shorter efforts. I was looking at this race optimistically, but knew my legs would be tired after a long week of training. Well, I ended up being more tired than my legs. I couldn’t sleep well on Friday night and neither could Rose. We got up early and barely made it to the race before our start times. We opted to get later start times, but were both sluggish. I was going to do two runs, but decided to just do one instead. Plus, it was sprinkling and fairly humid BUT BARELY ANY WIND!!!
I was still excited to have a short race with a lack of wind and was adamant about focusing on my power values to ensure I was going push it harder than I would in a 40K TT. Yep, everything went according to plan, but I fell victim to a “rookie” mistake. Turns out my race # was flapping in the wind, which pretty much killed an “aero” advantage I got from my “aero” gear. Oh, well, I was happy with my higher power output and knew my average speed would have been higher had I been more careful with my pinning. Plus, this race was on the Harvard TT course, which got me more excited for the state championships in a couple of months.
BTW, races like this separate those who are good at shorter distances vs longer distances vs those who are good at no matter what they do. After a few years of TTs, I’ve realized that I’m in the middle group and still have much to master about these shorter races…:)
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