For those of you who are better at mental arithmetic then you’ll realise that 1246hrs or 80760minutes, is 8 weeks and 2hours. Which to the best of my recall was the last time I rode a mountain bike (or any other bike) …..until today….not that I’ve been counting or anything
So just going back along the timelines. 2nd of August was when I had my “high speed ground interface”. 2 weeks 2 days later (after a couple of X rays, a CT scan and some poor NHS communication) I had a op to put in a metal plate, helping to mesh together the four parts of my distal collar bone and the broken ligament.
From this point there was (it seemed) a long period of recovery which left me initially unable to do very much at all apart from sit around, then slowly get movement in my arm/shoulder. The op and recovery co-insided with our summer holiday which didn’t go down to well with the Mrs, who did 2 weeks of driving, plus looking after our little fella and my neice & nephew who we’d gererously offerred my sister to take on holiday (hindsight is a wonderful thing!).
About two weeks ago I started driving (auto only to begin with) and for the last week I’ve been thinking of getting on the turbo trainer, which has only been put off due to a horrible cold, oh and the fact that I hate them.
After sitting on the turbo yesterday and feeling fine, we decided that since our little fella was off to a childrens party for two hours this afternoon, it was the perfect excuse for me and the Mrs to sneek off for a couple of hours on the bikes.
In what was the glorious sunshine this afternoon off we went, me on the Trek Fuel Ex8 (choosing the full susser trying to have as soothing a ride as possible) and Debbie on her mini scale Orange Five. It was only meant to be a short ride over to Effingham Common along the brideway that runs from Bookham common to Effingham common, but with the day so beautiful and me having no riding aches we continued over the common, up the Old London road track to Dirtham Lane, over the Guildford road and up the singletrack up to Ranmore in the dappled autumn sunshine. Then it was a road blast along to the turn off for Tanners Hatch, down past the Hostel, up the side of Polesden Lacy along Connicut Lane, then down the Admirals trackway back to Fetcham, just in time to pick up sweaty six year old at the party (with envious looks from the dad in the SingleTrack tee shirt).
It was fanatastic to be out on the bike, especially after reading so many blogs of great rides. It did strike me though that the trails are in amazing shape, so dry, smooth and not particulalry dusty. I hope this weather lasts for a bit longer! Plus the temp this afternoon was the perfect short sleeve jersey riding weather. Our route certainly wasn’t the most gnarly thing I’ve ever ridden but I had no aches or pains and didn’t really notice the shoulder.
It was a great feeling to be back out on the bike again. Even though my waistline has sufferred, as has my fitness. Roll on Dusk til Dawn and my sedate progress round!
John Romer says:
Glad to see youre recovering well Tony – your first ride must be a big milestone. Won’t be long until you are challenging Barrie up Box Hill.
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Posted on September 28, 2009 at 4:55 am
Dave says:
“Not Particularly Dusty”?
You weren’t going fast enough you mean!
Good to see you’re back……did you manage 22 miles? That’s all you need to do next weekend…….
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Posted on September 28, 2009 at 8:56 am
tony says:
I told you I wasn’t going fast
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Posted on September 28, 2009 at 12:55 pm
Matt says:
Nice one Tony, good to hear you’re on the comeback trail.
It’s certainly a strange feeling that first ride after injury – you don’t know what you’ve got to deal with until then. Apart from the effort required to return to fitness it’s the unkown part as well.
I remember losing a lot of shoulder and arm strength and found myself wrenching the shoulder occassionally as it was quite slippy when I returned. Hopefully you won’t have that issue…
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Posted on September 28, 2009 at 1:26 pm
Jenks says:
I don’t know you, but am glad that you are on the mend – we all have offs every now and again, but pretend that they’ll never be bad ones. The speeds current mountain bikes are capable of does scare me sometimes, but in a good way. I used to ride motorbikes, but even then felt that there was more of an adrenalin rush on an MTB than on a motorbike. Why? Because whilst a motorbike will scare you witless, you access those times far less often than on a typical off-road ride.
And I can’t help feeling that that guy in the Singltrack t-shirt looked hacked off simply because he wasn’t wearing one of my designs! How’s the Muddy Mole one coming along by the way?
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Posted on September 28, 2009 at 4:34 pm
Richard says:
Great to see you back on the bike again Tony.
Which one is the ‘comeback trail’ again?
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Posted on September 28, 2009 at 5:02 pm
DaveW says:
Congratulations Tony – really glad to hear you are recovering and back on two wheels again!
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Posted on September 28, 2009 at 8:08 pm
Jem says:
I had a double take when I heard my name shouted out. That sounded like Tony, can’t be. Looked round is it? is’nt it, is it, Bloody hell it is.
Good to see you out on the bike again, I hope the fitness returns quickly for you. Somehow I have a feeling you will soon be making me pedal hard to keep up with you.
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Posted on September 29, 2009 at 5:41 pm
tony says:
Thanks everyone for your encouraging comments. I’m just delighted to be back on the bike again.
Just in time to watch everyone else suffer at Dusk til Dawn
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Posted on September 29, 2009 at 10:59 pm
Colin says:
What you mean “watch”
You is ridin bruvver
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Posted on September 30, 2009 at 11:45 am
Jez says:
Good to see you’ll be out on the course. Don’t mention the ‘suffer’ word thank you very much. I’m trying not to think about it.
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Posted on September 30, 2009 at 12:30 pm