The best time for me to ride my bike is before dawn. Although it is still dark I have put three blinking lights on my bicycle and so if a motorist doesn’t see me it is because he is willfully trying not to see me. There are few cars on the road before dawn and I like my chances much better that riding in the afternoon when there are a string of cars tailing me. Although the first car sees me there is no guarantee that the second, third, or fourth car will see me. Between the lights on my bike, and the reflector jacket that I wear, I feel comparatively safe biking in the morning as opposed to the afternoon.
Unfortunately there is more to worry about on the road than cars. One morning I was thrown from my bike while doing my usual route. I hit a small animal on the road and, while the bike stopped suddenly, my body kept going and I hurdled over the handle bars. I don’t even know what I hit because it happened so quickly and it was still dark outside. All I know is that there was a dark shadow under my wheel, and that was all. I knew that I was hurt badly and I writhed in pain while lying on the street. Slowly I worked up the strength to pull my bike off of the road. Hoping that the accident was just a temporary inconvenience, for I had been thrown from my bike before and had cracked a couple of ribs, this time I knew that it was more serious. The pain would not go away because I had pulled my ACL muscle away from my shoulder. I needed surgery to sew my arm back into place.
As a result of being thrown from my bike I had a third degree dislocation of my shoulder and my ribs have been bruised. It hurt when I breathed deeply and sneezing threw me into intense seizures of pain. I had scabs on my elbow, knee, and lower leg from where I hit the pavement and skidded to a stop. My clavicle bone has been separated from my shoulder because the ligaments that hold the two together had been severed. For two weeks I couldn’t tie my own shoes or put on my own shirt because it put me in too much pain to stretch my arm and shoulders to complete these simple tasks. My wife, to whom I owe all of my success for the relentless support that she has given me, helped me get dressed every morning so that I could go to work.
After laying in the grass for a while I finally picked up my bike and started to walk home. The first two times that I tried to walk I became light headed and had to lie back down in the grass again. Only on the third try did I successfully work up the strength to make the long walk home. My daughter drove me to the hospital but I couldn’t bend down to get into the car and so I had to lie down in the back. Once at the emergency room the nurses had to cut off my shirt to take x-rays and then they pumped me full of painkillers and muscle relaxers. The next four days were filled with nothing but sleeping and watching television and that was difficult for me since I am hyperactive and always like to be moving.
Here is the crazy part. I decided to do the Ironman again that year in spite of being hurt. This is not a sport for well people and I proved that by getting back on my bike within a week of the accident. At first I rode with one arm and, over the course of the next three months when the race would be held, I found I could push down on the handlebars of my bike without pain. If I tried to pick anything up that was heavier than two textbooks then I simply cannot do it. But I could still bike and run.
On race day I did the dog paddle with my right arm and powered through with my left arm and my legs. It took me two hours to finish the swim but I did it. The sick thing was that while I was in line to get in the water I tried to hide my shoulder from the race officials. If they saw that my clavicle was sticking up away from my shoulder, in a position that is not natural, then they would not allow me to participate. I got on the bike all right but couldn’t finish the whole 112 miles. The two hour swim had taken too much out of me. When I stopped biking after 70 miles and gave up my chip at the medical tent I told the doctor that my clavicle was separated from my shoulder. He said that he was surprised that I had made it this far.. I thought so too and was pleased with my effort even though I didn’t finish the race that year. The story of my accident and my one-armed swim in the Ohio River would be one that I would tell over and over through the years because I was so proud of taking the pain.
The doctor who performed my corrective surgery two weeks after the Ironman said that rehab was going to be painful but that I shouldn’t be too worried about it as I had waited three months to have the operation. The pain that I would feel wouldn’t be any worse that what I had just been through. He said it with a tinge of admiration but the doctor also gave me a couple of side glances, trying to figure just who did I think I was, delaying major surgery so that I could participate in the world’s most difficult sport. The he reattached my clavicle to my shoulder using cadaver ligaments to keep the whole thing in place. I went through physical therapy with the help of a nurse at first but then thought that I knew better how to get my body into shape. I stopped going to the clinic and instead went back to the gym. The next Ironman Louisville was less than a year away and I wanted to start training for it.
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