ttt crap sandwich

How prophetic was my prediction from last week?

Should be fun and painful.

It was fun, then it was extremely painful.
For some reason, i decided not to wear gloves Saturday morning, this would come back to haunt me. We started well, and because everyone is on the course at once, began to pass teams almost immediately.

The first lap flew by in 23 minutes something. Everybody was looking strong and taking at least one minute pulls, Norm took over twice that long once in the tailwind. We were really flying and the second lap seemed to go easier. Brian appeared to be getting stronger. We passed some more teams which had follow vehicles and that made passing interesting, then a rebellious bunch of tri people swerved into the left lane and made us pass them on the right, more thrills, but the best was yet to come.

With about a mile or so to go in the second lap, we came upon our Cat 4 team. The way that we came up on them, it felt like we were probably going 4 or 5 mph faster than them in the headwind. I couldn't tell our speed there because my trusty cyclocomputer (!@#$%!@#$%!@) went out in the first lap. They were middle of the lane, Norm was on the front and we passed them near the centerline. We let them know we were passing, they heard us. I'm not sure what happened next, stories vary, the major theme being that the Cat 4 team rotated as we passed them and evidently our guys slowed down. I know this last part to be true because i was third wheel and i ran up the back of Brandon, who was second, pronto and before i could do much i was down. While sliding i started wondering if Brian would be able to avoid me but soon he was sliding past me. Race over.

Once i made sure i hadn't broken my collar bone i looked at my bike and it wasn't good. In an effort to stay up, my handle bars had slipped straight down and then been driven into the side of the top tube putting a nice size dent in two places. So Erik Espade is now going to be a wall decoration in my garage. Luckily i didn't hit my head, so the tt helmet survived.

The damage to me was skin loss, the best being a hunk of flesh removed from my knee with a little flap left to cover it, looking like some sort of pathetic epidermis comb-over. Then in no specific order elbow, shoulder, hip, tricep, shin and best for last, the palms of my hands. Thanks to Gloria for cleaning me up after.

I was bummed out, because for once our team was actually very evenly matched and i know we would have had a good time. Brandon said we had "27 high" for an average at that point. Norm was the wisest, "Hey remember the most important thing here, you didn't crash me!"

The crash didn't seem to affect Brian too much who won the Cat 4 road race on Sunday. Since then i've been walking around like Edward frickin Scissorhands unable to grasp most things. NICE.

Oh yeah, and never ever use this liquid bandage crap. Amy put some on my hands and i haven't had a burn that bad since using a stiptic pencil as a teenager. Later i read the instructions and wasn't suprised to see BOTTLED IN MORDOR hidden tactfully on the bottom of the box. DON'T DO IT!