I had to get Jay’s bike ready for this race. I decided to run 34×18 and let it all hang out for Sunday. Talked to Lou and Mandi rode to Halters to meet me and hang out for a little. Talk a bunch. I really wanted to get out; Lou was heading to Six Mile and it would have been a great time to test out the Seven, but I figured we are doing that tomorrow and I don’t have too much interest in it. I didn’t want to get home late again. I knew that it was going to be too close, so I bag it and we head home and try and figure out what we are going to do for dinner. And then everything changes.

My phone rings; Usually means its my parents because they are the only ones who really call me. I turn my phone over and it’s Lou. Great, means he flatted and I need to pick him up at Six Mile. No biggie. I pick up and as usual, Lou is kind of distracted and talking to someone else. Dude really needs to remember that YOU CALLED ME, I’m giving you my full attention. Anyway, he says he forgets why he called me.

Hmm, Okay.

All the sudden someone else’s voice. “Hey, this is Todd, your friend took a pretty good spill….” I think, how bad could it be? He’s walking around and called me, He isn’t dead. I tell Todd I will meet him at South Middlebush/Trailhead and pick him up. As I drive over there I keep thinking, man, can’t believe he broke his bike or flatted, etc etc. I assume that’s why he needs a ride.

We park at SMB and I see the MTBNJ colors and some other guy with a dog. Lou is angry and cursing and frustrated, still semi normal. He turns around to me and I see the left side of his face, he’s got a nice cut on his face and some blood, but still, nothing too crazy. He’s talking to me, standing and seems like this guy is really just blowing this out of proportion. Walk over to my car and make sure I have all of his crap, put him in the front seat, load the bike, etc etc. Once we are all in the car I figure we will goto Casa and get some dinner.

I make him look me in the eye and see where he is mentally. I say “How do you feel, seriously?” Todd said he needs to goto the hospital. Lou knows himself and I know Lou pretty well, so we can figure this out. He says “I called you?”

Okay, this is scary. I figure we drive back to the 27 lot and he will drive home IF I think this is a good situation. The drive from SMB to 27 is about 10 minutes. In that 10 minutes, I realize he is completely screwed up and took a huge hit to the dome piece. Uh oh. He has no idea what happened and can’t remember why I came to get him.

We roll into the 27 lot and I’m 90% sure we are going to the hospital. I park behind his car and he sees his Scalpel on the car. He is completely confused. Almost like a magician put the bike on his rack. Okay, Hospital here we come.

Mandi follows me and I try and talk to Lou. He keeps trying to figure out what is happening and why he is with me here. How I got here. It was a broken record. I’m trying not to smile because I know this is serious. Lou calls his Mom and I can tell just by what he is saying, that she is completely confused. I force him to give me the phone and talk to her.

RWJ here we are! Almost get our cars towed, but get all checked in. Lou is completely frustrated at this point, but this is how he normally would be.

Lou doesn’t remember this.

While we are waiting, I tell Lou to give me his phone. I need his moms number, but also I wanted to see what else happened. I noticed Lou called me, then his favorite Pho place, and then Paypal. All have P’s in them, but why would he try and call them after he spoke with me?

It all makes sense, he couldn’t remember if he even called me. Oh man.

Get the cars situated, and we get taken in pretty quick. Lou can’t remember what year it is and wasn’t 100% sure what month it was. He did remember Obama was the President. Show the nurse his helmet and I chill with Lou before and after his CAT scan. His sister shows up, followed by his Mom. I fill her in and let her know what is going on, but I can’t stay because only one person is allowed in the room at a time. No need for me to be here. I head home and try and digest everything.

It’s a lot to digest, it’s 11:30PM and I still haven’t ate dinner; Just running on adrenaline at this point.

It really comes down to just wearing a helmet. Lou has no idea how he fell, but I have no idea what would have happened without one of these devices. The other thing I’ve learned from this is that people need to know where you are. I always make sure one person (99% of the time it’s Mandi) where I’m going and some sort of time frame. If I’m not back by then, call me. Having your phone on you is now mandatory. If he didn’t have a phone, maybe he gets back to the car. The Edge 510/810 syncing this is a great option too.

I’ve always gotten on people for not wearing them, but now it seems like I need to do more to make sure these people are safe. If this Todd guy came up on Lou without a helmet, could he have just been laying down dead? No one wants to find someone like that.

Saturday
Impossible to sleep in with this cat, even though I needed it. I see Lou texted me at 2AM and he’s home, so that is good. His mom calls and fills me in a little and is very thankful. At the same time, I don’t think I need to be thanked, this is just something you are suppose to do. When your friends need you, you show up.

We meet Robin and Jeremy for a little SS shakedown. I was really feeling this gear here. As always, Six Mile always makes you feel like a superstar. Such a great spot to feel like a pro. Jeremy and I take turns turning up the pace and were totally in the zone. Meet the girls back at the lot because I didn’t think we were playing nice, but they didn’t seem to mind

http://connect.garmin.com/activity/304156579

Chat it up, it was a beautiful day in the sun.

We saw this dog driving a car in the lot too.

Even though we parked at the Canal lot, we drove all the way to 27 for some tacos.

Always. So. Good.

I forgot the rest of the day, but I’m sure it was awesome. Tried to rest from last night. I know we went to bed pretty early, because 5:30AM is going to come regardless of if we are ready for it or not.

Sunday comes, and I love waking up earlier than the cat, because then SHE is the one who is pissed. Sucker. Pump my own gas in NY and get all set up. Warm up with Dan Strum on the fire road and ask what gear he is running. 34×16. LOL, WTF!? Scouted out where the pot holes were on the road and headed back to the line. Okay, the juicy stuff.

The Plan
Blow up at the top of Major Mike and hold on for dear life. I would hope that I don’t need to ride that hard after that. Suck the wheels of people for the first 2 miles and take me to the promise land. Blow up just like all my peers, but just in front of them and keep that gap.

We line up and I find myself in the 4th row, with eyes on Jeremy, Iggy, Eric O all within arms length. We go off and Holy crap, we are flying. I leap frog from rider to rider and find myself near the front of this race.

Okay, so far so good.

We get to Major Mike and I can still see the front of the race, Iggy in front of me, and Eric O behind me. We all churn up and I’m slowly losing Iggy pace. I real him back in at the end of MM, and let Eric jump in front and close the gap 100%. Iggy is starting to get a little more of a gap, and Eric takes a berm too hot and eats it. Make sure he is okay and he is, gets up and leads us on.

I eventually get disconnected from EricO and his 2:1 on a fire road and I’m kind of in no mans land. Billy Big Pants passes me and tells me he lost all his water. Ouch. I try to latch back on and tell him I have an extra bottle, but he drops me.

A couple of other faster people pass me, and eventually Jeremy is behind me. Just like last week. We ride together and chat a little, but realize not many people are around us. Plan is a success, but now I just need to stay on my bike. I feel recovered and totally feeling it today.

We dump out onto a FR and I smash a Gu. Jeremy asks if I have another one. He had to fix his wheel lost his Gu’s. He says he loves me and we press on.

Luke was in a great spot to showboat a little. You could tell he was set up right infront font of a sweet jump.:

Love how Jeremy slowed down a bit so he could J-Whip the shit out of it.

We battle with 2 other guys the rest of the race, some guy with a Moots jersey and Bikeman.com jersey. Both of these guys are strong than me, but I’m able to stick them on the FR and hold on for dear life. The gearing allowed me to close the gaps on the fire roads in a heartbeat, and recover.

The four of us (oh yeah, Jeremy wouldn’t leave me alone) Swap spots and pull away at certain points.

We jump onto the last section of FR and the Bikeman guy comes by on the fire road and wants to take the lead. I’m cool with that. I sit on his wheel HARD up this hill and actually rub tires with him. I apologized and we headed off.

We end up passing Mandi on the side of the road and she yells “Yeah that’s right, use him like a Hooker!”

That’s my soon-to-be-wife!

We see the arrows that lead us to Schofield, and I hear this loud sound of dirt exploding. All the road riding I’ve done lets me konw that Jeremy is coming around. he comes around the left and I jump on his wheel, right before we enter the water uphill that is the entrance to Schofield. I think about following Jeremy, but I decided to say screw it and jump back on the lead. I remember this trail is a nice gradual climb and hard to pass on the DH, so I had to stay in front. It hurts, bad.

I figure I dropped Jeremy on the uphill along with the Bikeman guy, but Jeremy is still here. Damnit. Can’t see Bikeman, I assume his lead out killed him and left us to battle it out. We reach the top and out of nowhere, Bikeman blows buy me on a risky spot, but with less than a mile to go, no one gets a free/easy pass. I’m hoping somehow I can get that spot back, but he takes the good lines and takes the spot.

I start hearing noise and see white tents and make sure I don’t crash.

http://connect.garmin.com/activity/304718332

Great race for me. My strategery worked and I somehow kept it together to finish 23rd. Chat it up with the peeps and I see that I’m not too far behind my peers, which excites me. Iggy and I both agree that Battenkill hurt worse than this. Sure it was painful, but nothing will top that as of today.

I already wrote too much, thought I would speak more about how the rest of the afterparty went down, but I won’t, so I will just leave it at that. Well except my allergies got really bad. Holy crap, I thought I was going to die later on once we got home.