Road Rash, Broken Toes, and Repairs

So here I am finally blogging again after a long dry spell. Monkey Light, Dirt Jr. and I really enjoyed your posts. We hope your available to ride when next we can make it to IL.

So what have we been up to?

Dirt Jr. had a nice spill on our last road ride about 5 weeks ago. We were tooling along with the wind behind us at about 18 miles per hour when I hear the unmistakable sound of metal scraping the pavement. I turned just in time to see my son sliding like a penguin on his belly with the bike trailing out behind him still caught up in his feet. A recap of the damage to the bike: The face of the computer was scraped but still readable and still working, a whole was ripped in the side of his seat, one of his grips was nearly torn off, and there were other cosmetic scraps and scratches. Now the really important damage report, Dirt Jr. had a scraped elbow (pretty deep) scraps on his knees, ribs,and shoulder, and he bruised his hip or pelvic bone, but in true CK and HandyRider fasion he got back up and road the rest of the way home. he healed quickly and though he will have a scar on his elbow his love of biking hasn't dimmed in the least.

We have been working on defining the trails we have made around the house. How do you define trails? Well you ride them of course, around and around and like magic the familiar serpentine single track begins to develop. We had been riding almost everyday and one afternoon about 3 weeks ago or so I decided that the corners needed to be a bit wider so that we could really hit the turns hard. The weed wacker had fried so I, still wearing my bike gear helmet glasses and all, fired up the big Cub Cadet walk-behind lawn mower and started to attack the 2-3 foot tall weeds, big mistake! I rounded out the first corner then propmtly hit the second corner, the foolishness of my ways was not apparent until the third corner. I had just pushed into the weeds when the mower bucked and threw a rock about 1 and 1/2 times the size of a golf ball out the back of the mower and directly into my right foot. It stung but I wasn't sure how bad it was. I thought I'd try and ride through it. I put the mower away and hopped on the Stumpjumper. First time around the loop I felt a little numb, on the second time around it was glaringly obvious that the pain in my foot was more then just a nuisance. I hung the bike, took off my shoe and pealed off my sock, it wasn't pretty, already my pinky toe and the toe next to it were a deep shade of purple. As the next few days progressed my whole foot swelled and all of my toes, save the biggest, turned black and puffy. Needless to say I wasn't going to be riding for awhile.

As if broken toes weren't enough during the recovery period I had a gout attack in the same foot. So now my ankle and big toe were swollen read and hurt worse then my toes. More time with my foot elevated. When I saw the kidney doc he informed that since I have a high uric acid content in my system that an injury to a joint can cause a gout attack. Oh the joy :)

Well after three weeks of recovery I started riding again. My toe was still tender and at first all I could handle was one or two miles on our little track around the house before my foot would begin to swell again. By Saturday last I was starting to feel pretty good and hammering the trails pretty hard. Monday after work I was on my thirty second or thirty third lap (6 laps is a mile)when I heard a weird popping sound comming from the front of my bike. Back at the garage my fears where realized I had blown out my Fox fork for the second time. After a shower I threw the bike in the car and took it down to the shop hoping they could fix it, unfortunately the fork is in a box on a UPS truck heading back to its makers to once again be rebuilt. To add to my woes the beans were taken off the back 4 acres Monday evening so now is the time to finish the last two thirds of our trail, but I have no mountain bike. Yes I still have the Moab but I gave it to Dirt Jr. and he'll be riding it. The Tricross can handle the abuse but this evening I will find out if my body can handle the abuse of the stiff frame off road. wish me luck.

Some other good news my wife, who doesn't like road riding, has been riding the small loop around our house. She does about a mile or so (6-8 laps) before the relentless bone jarring trail has the best of her. I'm just happy that she is riding and the trail will smooth out over time.

By the way yesterday we transplanted 4 white swamp oaks (they do well in clay soil) to our property. Next we will be planting Blueberry bushes and Raspberries. We are also laying out a two-hole, par three, disc golf course on our property. We haven't decded if were going to buy the portable baskets or the permanent ones yet. Well that's the happenings in NE Indiana keep riding, padling, hiking, and living in the great outdoors.