Waterman's Olympic Relay - Picking Myself Up Again

This wasn’t the post-Covid comeback season I thought it would be, be closed out the year on a positive note. I had trained hard for Musselman, only to end up participating as a cheerleader. Originally wanted to train up for that distance again this year because of all the hard work I’d put into it this spring. The fact is though, jumping back on that bike wasn’t the easiest thing in the world. One day on a winery outing (cause the best ideas come together over wine!), I tossed around the idea of Waterman’s triathlon as a relay…. Long course. Kelly kind of looked at me with a raised eyebrow. Interested but not sure if her goals aligned with running a half marathon. She’d think about it. Still, I hadn’t been back outside on the bike - on the trainer and once on the W&OD trail - but not on the roads. What was I thinking I would be able to ramp back up to 56 miles if I couldn’t get any real training rides in. Went back to Kelly with the idea of Olympic distance and she was enthusiastically in!

I decided to go to a team ride in nokesville. Time to get back in the saddle (pun intended)  my plan was to join up with the beginners in a no-drop easy pace ride. 26 miles. We set out and immediately I felt the anxiety building. I figured as I kept going, the encouru would eventually ease up. Except it went the other direction.  I dropped from my 2nd position spot and was now the last of our little group. The panic set in as cars were wizzing by us… coach Ed came and retrieved me after only 6 miles  suddenly I’m unsure of even Olympic distance  But I was committed. I’m grateful I had signed up for a relay because if it were only for myself, I might have backed out… and I feel like nobody would have questioned me.

Still confining most of my rides to the trainer, I checked in with Laura who had recently gotten herself a new bike and was up for some training rides. Outside! We stayed in and around Herndon, biking from our neighborhood and exploring the area…. On roads, with traffic. It’s not quite the same as open country roads, but it was a start.

Race morning. The nerves are there. I made my iced tea and Kelly, Sweeney and I set out from our rental house to the race site. Easy check-in, xena racked (new bike replacement is still on Covid back order), and made our way over to the team z tent. I grabbed a banana which would later prove to be not enough, but there wasn’t much I felt like eating. Socializing with the team, wetsuit and all the other things…. Somehow in that hour(ish) I heard about 500(ish) various bike crash stories. Awesome, thanks for sharing.

We all made our way over to the swim start. It was a time trial start vs wave start. Took my ginger pills and albuteral tab (instead of inhaler - works better for me). Lined myself up, made my way to the dock, gave my race number to the official and jumped in.  Cold!  It didn’t take me long to settle into a rhythm. The water was choppy! It would soon become apparent that I spent way too much time focusing on the bike and not too much time in the pool. Slower than I would have liked, but I was moving along. Along the final stretch of the first of 1.75 loops I felt a sting on my arm… jellyfish!  They were everywhere!  I can’t recall if I’ve ever been stung by a jellyfish before, but if so, it was nothing like this. The damn thing must have attached itself to my arm and hung out for a bit. Ouch!

I felt my Garmin alert twice, which is set to go off every 500 yards. For a 1500m swim I should be over 2/3 done. Except I wasn’t. I had at least half a loop to go. I’m not sure if the course was measured long, or if I was swimming way off course…. But based on my log map, I held a pretty good line to the buoys. Finally on the last stretch, I made my way to the finish. How long can I stretch this out so I don’t have to get on that bike?  Not long enough, soon it was time to climb up the ladder for T1. Heading up the dock I passed Sweeney and Kelly cheering…. It was time.

Socks on. Bike shoes on. Helmet on. Sunglasses on - not cycling sunglasses since I failed to replace those. I glanced around but there was nothing left to do. It was showtime.

Heading out of transition Kelly was there telling me to just stay calm. It took me a few extra seconds to get clipped in, but was then able to settle down a bit. I gave myself permission to settle into a low gear, who cares how long this takes. Easy does it. I glanced down at my Garmin and not even a mile had elapsed. Breathe. Luckily the shoulders were wide and the traffic was light, though my hands and wrists started hurting a lot from my tight grip on the handlebars. I caught myself holding my breath every time I heard an approaching car (or in some cases a cyclist with noisy disc wheels). But I was doing it.

The Olympic distance separated from long course at mile 13 and once I made that turn I was pretty confident I would make it. The “hill” that I had been nervous about was nothing; maybe I had some muscle memory from all my hard work earlier in the season…. Though to put it in perspective, the net elevation gain over the 25 miles was X, so pretty flat overall.

A few women who had passed me in the first 15 or so miles were all still within sight. I felt that if I could keep it that way, I wasn’t as alone out there on the roads (which if you think about is kind of silly because they were well out of earshot). Then we turned into the headwind. OMG the headwind. My hands and wrists hurt. My arm was stinging from the jellyfish sting. I will also point out the last time i rode in a tri-suit (i.e. minimally padded bike shorts) was Nov 2019. Those last 10 miles were so hard, but now I knew this was going to happen. Barring a mechanical issue, I was going to be OK. In fact, that realization pumped me up to really pick it up in the last 5 miles. I ended up passing all 5 of the ones who I’d been eyeing.

Last mile!! I was so ready to be off the bike, not because it was an awful ride but because I couldn’t really say “I did it” until I was back in transition. Got to the dismount line and Kelly was right there. I have never been so happy to see her and have her take that timing chip from me. She was off and I was done! Hooray!

Sweeney met up with me and we wandered over to the team Z tent for some medical ointment for the sting. It was still stinging and in fact seemed like it was getting worse… maybe because now that my race was over I was concentrating on it more. Then it was cheer time. We walked over to the impromptu team cheering area with our cowbells.

Kelly was fast!  She came around well before expected as we cheered her into her second lap, and equally as fast heading into the finish 3 miles later.  We all met up at the finish line for some “after” photos and collected our medals. We joined Joann and Dan out for lunch and back to the rental house for a couple days of laughs and shenanigan.  So happy to have done this race, and as part of a relay team!

The Aftermath

 Sunday, June 27:

I woke up and started to assess the situation.  Bruises were starting to form pretty much everywhere.  Joann showed up pretty early with donuts and a ton of medical supplies.  We started cleaning out all of the wounds - there were a LOT.  I feel like I'm mostly covered in bandages.

Linda and Chris (recovering from his own bike crash a month earlier) from Team Z came over that evening and brought food and treats - so nice!!

Monday, June 28:

My discharge instructions told me to visit my primary doctor as a follow up, and while Dr. Lee was not in the office, one of his associates was able to see me same day.  No new information.  I am to clean out all of my wounds several times per day.  What a tedious and obnoxious process, and I was going through so many medical supplies.  Bruising looked pretty bad.

Travis and Jasmine came over with a bunch of food that my office had brought in for what should have been a "good luck at Mussleman tri" potluck for me.  Nice to hang out with them for a few hours.

Tuesday, June 29:

Last year, while I was goofing around with my nephew, I managed to hurt my knee.  I'd had several ortho doctors check me out (mostly because I didn't care for the diagnosis of osteonecrosis; an incidental finding), and the one I really liked asked me to come back for a 6-month follow-up.  Unfortunately, that doctor had left the practice, and I'd been meaning to cancel the appointment, but hadn't... I decided to keep it and get my bones checked out.  What a quack - as soon as this new doctor saw all my bandages and heard the word "accident" he saw dollar signs.  He didn't listen to anything I had to say, didn't examine me at all. He asked to see the road rash... huh?  I'm asking about my hip, knee and leg... what an awful, awful experience.

Then, since I had a bruise on the side of my face, I visited my dentist to make sure there was no damage. Sure enough, one of my crowns was loose and he had to fix it.

So sick of doctors.

That night, I noticed a rash starting to form on my back and right hip.  I texted Joann, thinking it must be an infection.  I survived the Ford Explorer but mersa was gonna take me out.  She told me to watch it for a day or so, and we'd reassess later.  Fine...

Left hip was the point of impact.  If you look close you can see the imprint of the SUV's grill.

Wednesday, June 30:

Rest day, finally!  Except not so much rest as starting to collect all of the initial documentation the lawyer is requesting.  It took the whole day.  I was at the computer all the way up until Travis and Brandon showed up with Thai food for dinner.  Exhausted!!

Friday, July 2:

OK, yea, so remember that rash I had noticed?  Now it was perfectly obvious to me, I was dying of mersa.  Of course I waited until 9pm to decide this, but I promptly drove myself to urgent care.  I explained my situation, and he took a look.... "Well this isn't mersa.  It looks to me like poison ivy."  And suddenly I had flashes of memory of all the paramedics and passers-by on the side of the road talking about me lying in a bunch of poison ivy.  D'oh!

The doctor also took the opportunity to check out the rest of my wounds.  Turns out the puncture on my leg is severely infected.  He sent me home with a round of fairly strong antibiotics, special ointment, and firm instructions not to participate in Musselman in any fashion (it had crossed my mind to do the swim).

Trust me, this is the PG version of the poison ivy... No pics from when it got really bad!

Tuesday, July 5:

Return to work with my seat cushion since my hip was still not interested in being seated.  

The poison ivy patches were looking pretty ugly, and I was all bandaged up (and re-bandaged several times thanks to Jason and Travis).  You could say I was a walking hot mess.  

Thursday, July 7:

New ortho!  Joann referred me to her ortho surgeon who took a much closer look at my knee.... and in the process, discovered a hematoma on the outside of my leg.  More meds and a scheduled PRP injection - highly recommend over cortisone!

Hematoma on my leg - didn't even know that was a thing!

Friday, July 9 - Wednesday, July 

Road trip!  Dan picked me up from the office and we started the drive to New York.  Even though I wasn't racing, we were still making the journey to Musselman.  Met up with Mere and Andre and checked in with Team Z.  We were about to walk less than 1/4 mile to get to ~mile 50 of the bike course, so easy to cheer.  Otherwise, it was exactly the relaxing weekend with friends that I needed.

Lots more follow-up visits and knee injection and all the legal stuff was still lingering, but life was going to start looking more normal.

Built Ford Tough

Saturday, June 26:

It was a typical early Saturday as I headed out to Riley’s Lock (in MD, north of the city, along the Potomac) for my last big training day before Musselman. The majority of the team was in Williamsburg for the other mid-season “A” race, so at first this was to be an unsupported ride - no sags, no sign-in sheets, etc, etc.  Luckily enough people showed interest that we had a few volunteers agree to come support.

Many of those doing this ride were doing a brick workout. The 70.3 distance folks were doing 3 hour ride + 1 hour run.  For Debbie, who I'd been training with much of the last few months, this meant 40 miles on the bike. I was training for aquabike though (no run) so I felt it made more sense for me to do a longer ride vs a brick and grabbed the 50 mile cue sheet. Debbie and I set out together and over the first 20 miles had conversations about our personal achievements so far this season. I was especially proud of myself for getting up a series of steep hills earlier in this ride. We came to a rest stop where sag, Lynisa, was hanging out. The 40 and 50 mile routes diverged within the next mile, so Debbie and I said goodbye and I was on my own.

There was another hill that I remembered from previous years riding this same route.  It was only a mile or so after I parted ways with Debbie. And I made it up so easy! I felt this was going to be a good ride. I was still smiling to myself as I felt a weird “bump” on my back tire. It felt as though I was tubing on a river and another tube bumped into mine. What was that??!!  I had this odd sense of floating or being in the air…. But that’s it.

I was suddenly lying on the side of the road, on my right side, facing back the direction I had come.  What had happened?  I kinda screamed out, but it wasn’t a scream like I was startled or even in pain. It was a confusion scream, scared scream, not sure what to do scream.  I felt what I could with my hands and found a huge hole ripped out of my shorts.  I didn’t see anybody around. How did I end up here?  And then a voice… “are you ok?” The voice was coming from behind me. I knew enough not to move and try to look, nor could I formulate any words. So I “screamed” again. Then a woman was standing over me. I heard her call 911… “I hit a cyclist”

“Joann?” … “I’ve been hit by a car” …. Literally the hardest conversation I’ve ever had, after I’d asked the lady to call her. Several passers-by had stopped at this point, looking me over, holding a towel up to my elbow. Joann was on speaker (the woman was holding the phone), and the strangers let her know what hospital was closest. She would meet me there. Then I was able to scroll to Debbie’s number. Somebody on the team should know what happened. As I was on the call, Lynisa pulled up. She knelt beside me telling me ambulance was on its way, that she would make sure all the things were taken care of. I was worried about my bike and how that would get back to me. Somebody commented that I wouldn’t be using that again…. No silly, not today, obvi… but I’m going to want that back!  I now know that the person meant my bike was no longer ridable, frame cut in pieces. I stopped my Garmin.

I heard sirens. It sounded like a lot. Suddenly there were so many paramedics standing over me. Discussing how to get me on the backboard (I had landed on an incline next to the road). Discussing which came first, C-collar or taking off my helmet. Also, somebody wanted to take my helmet.  Lynisa reminded them I was likely still attached to the bike.  I still didn’t know what was wrong with me. I had heard the strangers gasping but nobody said a word. So many things going on, so many conversations, such chaos.

I’m in the ambulance. It was weird being kept so still with the backboard and c-collar. I could only see the roof of the ambulance.  The EMT with me hooked me up to a couple machines and took some stats. She talked me through everything she was doing. I had a lot of questions, not about me, but the process and how things work. “Category B”, “Trauma Level 2”, “ETA 18 minutes”, “Suburban” were all things she was calling into the radio. Wow, 18 minutes! Wait, what does “suburban” mean? I asked… it’s where we were going. Wait. Not shady grove? Umm, can you call my friend? I asked her what the various noises meant. We only put on sirens when there was traffic around. Loud echo-y sirens were when we went under and overpass. Weird beeping noises meant that we were pulling into the hospital.

Trauma surgeons everywhere. Everybody shouting and yelling commands. Nobody talking directly to me. They expected the worst. I asked the nurse if she really had to cut off my favorite jersey - can I try to shimmy out? No, it has to go. Everything has to go. X-rays. Scans. I was cold.  A surgeon asked if I needed pain medication.. no, I was ok. I didn’t feel anything (not in a way that I couldn’t wiggle my toes, but I was numb). He told me I would change my mind and to let him know when I do. CT scan. As they are wheeling me out of trauma bay, I hear the radio for the next arrival. “ETA 7 minutes, GSW to the chest, through and through.” Wow. I was their easy case.

Trauma patient Quattro Forty. Cyclist vs SUV. That’s all anybody knew me as when the wheeled me into a corner (which turned out to be a room, but what the hell did I know, I was still positioned to only look up). This meant that neither Joann nor Lynisa could get any information because the hospital did not know me by my name.  I was there for awhile. I could hear talking, but they were to other patients, other nurses and doctors.  I was there for a long time.  

A police officer came in to talk about the case.  I don’t know why it hadn’t occurred to me that the police were called also. The lady who had hit me stayed on scene.  I am thankful she stayed.  There wasn’t much for the cop to say. He had looked at my clothing, noted the clear weather (not a cloud in sight), had talked to the woman and also Lynisa.  He told me there was a good bit of damage on the Ford Explorer that hit me.  I had been rear-ended so there wasn’t much I could contribute. The driver never saw me, never hit her brakes and struck me at about 45mph.  He gave me the report and left.

So much time passed.  I was getting uncomfortable.  No, I was starting to hurt.  Everything hurt.  Finally a nurse came in and I asked her to reposition my shoulder.  She cleaned out some glass from the wound. I also got those pain meds. The nurse didn’t know anything else though and they couldn’t remove the backboard yet. She did loosen the c-collar. I asked her if she could go find Joann and update her.  She tried, but no luck, she couldn’t find Joann. I was confused. I raised my arm up to try to see what time it was… my Garmin was gone!  I was worried I would be late to meet the crew for Dan’s birthday drinks. I was worried about how I would make it home to feed the dogs before meeting my friends.  I asked the nurse to hold the room phone up to my ear and dial Joann’s number. No answer.

Finally, finally, finally, they could remove the backboard. To everyone’s surprise, there were no major injuries.  There were some deep cuts and contusions, but nothing too serious.  How can that be?!  One fracture appeared in the scans, so I was to wait to talk to the doctor about that. I was starving but afraid to eat or drink because how would I be able to use the bathroom on a broken ankle. It didn’t feel broken though?  Oh but also… I was naked, draped only in the bed sheets.  How was that going to work for leaving the hospital?  I was now able to use the phone myself and called Joann again. Voicemail. In the middle of my message, somebody brought a bag of my belongings. I had my phone and my Garmin back!  Holy hell it was after 2pm!  I called Heidi and she answered. Lynisa (who Joann had recognized cause of her Team Z shirt) and they went to retrieve my car and get my bike loaded up. Heidi and Joann were en route to my house to drop off my car and they would feed my pups. I told them my status and that I expected to be able to leave once I spoke with the ortho doctor.

I had to be told explicitly that I could not participate in the Cicada Swim the next morning - the 1.7 mile open water event in National Harbor.  I texted Dani with the bad news.  I think I left out the part about the accident?  Joann sent me a photo of my broken bike which I forwarded out to some friends and family, with an "oh by the way, the reason my bike is broken...."

Coach Ed called me.  He asked if I was still planning to do Musselman in 2 weeks.  My answer wasn't "no."

An hour later Joann showed up with clothes for me. I had gotten out of bed by now (wearing paper scrubs) and was able to use the bathroom and get a snack. Still no ortho doc. Joann and I started looking at all the cuts and scrapes. “No major injuries” does NOT mean unscathed. Everything still hurt. Joann helped clean me up and get me out of my paper outfit and into my sundress. Still no ortho doc. We waited another hour for him to show up and spend 2 min explaining that the fracture was actually old and unrelated. I was free to go. Seems anti-climatic... like all that and now I can just walk out of the hospital?  

Joann got the car and we met up with Heidi for dinner ( I was STARVING - not much breakfast and I hadn't gotten through most of my bike nutrition... and scared to eat/drink anything since I couldn't get up for bathroom).   Then Joann drove me home. I spent the next few hours catching up with some folks on the phone and then crashed.  So many mixed emotions of being scared, and angry, and confused... but definitely thankful because I know it could have been so much worse.

Thankful for all the visitors, food deliveries and gift cards, flowers, and all the get-well messages!