Just a little 8 hour race ...

It has been a relatively slow summer for the Go Banana bikers. After our spectacular finish at the BC Bike Race we seem to have only managed to get out on the bikes a handfull of times ... more often than not doing some damage to ourselves.

So I was pretty excited when Keira proposed that we take a short day trip down to Kingston and ride the J & J Cycle Eight Hour Mountain Bike Classic. I figured even though I hadn't ridden in a month that the bike karma gods would cut me a bit of slack for the the six months worth of training and seven consecutive six hour bike days I had in BC.

... in short I thought "Pfffttt ... 8 hours, two people ... piece of cake!".

I've never done a tag team before but I can tell you for sure that riding a fast rolling, twisty, turny 10Km course like the J&J Classic is tons of fun ... but way more effort then the head-down zone out riding we were doing in BC. Since the course was short, I'd just get out there and power my way through, coming across the finish (through a barn!) and gratefully tag Keira so that I could head off the course and start my snack time in an attempt to re-fuel the body for the next speed round.

... of course speed is all relative. While I thought I was burning up the course, I occasionally was being lapped by these youngin's who were pretty much flying through with 30 minute lap times.

We were hoping for 10 laps, and managed to get in 9 but with the sun and the heat we couldn't have asked for a better day!

... and now a word from my tag team partner Keira:

Thomas and I decided we hadn't really spent any time along together in a year and a half so a mtn bike race seemed like a good 'together' activity. We clearly weren't thinking as tag-teaming means you get about 10 words in every 45 minutes and they're usually along the lines of "any major falls?", "did you pass team 203?". Team "Go Banana's" training regime clearly helped t-man on his laps. Unfortunately, I've never been asked to be part of the team (even though I bought Thomas his first mtn bike, make him gluten-free energy treats and supported his 6 month BC Bike Training plan, but I digress) so I don't have access to their secret training methods. I am privy only to their bacon eating secrets - which resulted in an extra ten pounds for me to carry up the hills.

Anyhow - fun race. Other riders were super friendly and the atmosphere was great. Trails are pretty rooty so the day after you remember you're not 18 anymore and that you wished you splurged and bought a full suspension bike. Actually had to wait a few seconds for a cow to get off the trail so I could pass.

New Man Down - And Out!!

My Bike Karma has run out :(

Since the snow has melted we've been biking non stop getting ready for BC Bike race and put on lots of kilometers. Throughout all this time...no injuries. Then we biked the BC Bike race, 500km of biking filled with treacherous BC singletrack.....no injuries, not even a flat (except for very sore worn out ass and whole wack of tired).

Last week while in Kanata Lakes I got a flat and my seat busted (thank GOD that didn't happen during the race), that wasn't that bad but it was foreshadowing my bike karma might be running out.

So today while going a simple ride on O'Brien in Gatineau it started to rain on our way back...not that big an issue (it was actually very refreshing). However while crossing a simple 4 foot wide bridge everything went wrong. I lifted my front tire to get on the bridge and had a little slippage of my back tire so when I got on the bridge wasn't pointing all the straight...no worries, I was a little tight to the right side of the bridge but nothing to worry about. I braked and went to put my right foot down just to make sure I didn't do anything stupid.....but when I did stupidity happened. Hard soled bike shoes on a wet wood bridge can sometime slip...and it did. My right foot slipped off the bridge and every thing else followed.

The drop was about 3 feet but from the top of my bike it's more like 5 or so into a swampy rocky stream. Due to me experience falling (both in mtb and snowboarding) I'm usually pretty good at it. I almost never put my wrists out since I know they will snap. So I brought my arms to make a cage around my head and save my face, however this caused the entire force of my fall to be taken by my elbow on a sharp rock. It cut deep! lots of blood. Luckily I had some good friends to help me up from under the bridge and patch me up. They also were nice enough to join me in a 4km walk back to the cars dragging my bike along for me and drove me to the hospital (Thanks guys!!).

The rest of the day was spent in the hospital. The Doctor was very impressed with the depth and amount of dirt in my wound. It took almost an hour to clean all the dirt out of. After that came the stitches, since the wound was so deep they had to do 2 layers of stitches one for the skin and the other for all the stuff I tore underneath that.

And then after all this...just to top it off... I got a tetanus shot.

Anyways...it sucks and my arm hurts...a lot.

If anyone wants to go for a pleasant walk in the next week or so instead of biking...I'm in.

Jason