I had a hard fall on the road last night during our Tuesday night group ride out of Kannapolis and the asphalt won?!?!?! There were a few riders ahead of me which obstructed my view of some pretty big rocks on the road. When I hit one of them I was flipped sideways landing on my right hip, knee and chin. I broke my right hip and have a lot of road rash. I got stitches in my elbow and chin (the ER PA intern’s first stitches!!! I’m sure he learned from doing mine!!!) I’m really glad I didn’t break my jaw or collarbone. Boy, it sure happened quickly and was a hard glancing blow.

The rider behind me ran over my front wheel but fortunately was able to say upright. I haven’t had the chance to inspect my bike but I’m hoping my body took the brunt of the fall. The riders behind me said I gracefully rode the bike to the ground.

Our club goes to extremes to communicate potential hazards so who knows how I missed the cues. We weren’t really pushing the pace, just moving along at a comfortable 22-23 mph on flattish ground. The rocks came out of a gravel driveway and were further out in the road than normal. I hadn’t ridden a recovery ride since the 200k on Saturday but I had walked 18 holes on both Monday and Tuesday. My legs were feeling particularly good and I was already thinking about picking up the pace on a 1 mile climb a couple miles ahead just to see what I could do. I was probably close to my peak form for the year. I was well positioned in the group with just a handful of good, predictable riders ahead of me. It just happened so fast.....

I knew pretty immediately there were issues with my right hip. My leg was twisted a little and for sure wasn’t cooperating. I’d sure hate it if whatever damage I did to the Pinarello wasn’t repairable. That’s been a perfect everyday bike for me. I’ll check it out when I get out of the hospital.

Luckily one of bike club fellas had ridden that morning, is a professional videographer and was following us with his drone. He was out on the course in his pickup, heard the commotion and was onsite within minutes. He carried my bike and other riding stuff back to my van at the start. We then went to ER where my wife was waiting.

Ball in my right hip was toast. Through fortunate circumstances I wound up with having dialogue with a hip replacement specialist via his partner who was on call. After listening to me describe my various activities I wound up convincing them to do the full hip replacement. That should give me more service longer. We went from looking at doing a partial replacement with a non specialist to the top guy in the group doing the full replacement. I count my blessings for how that played out!!!

I was happy to donate my cycling shorts to the ER scissors. Just glad I didn’t have to remove them.

The doctor is telling me 6-8 weeks until I can ride a stationary bike and 3 months for golf. However he wouldn’t commit to a timeframe for road riding right now. I’m fine with that. We’ll see how things go. I’m guessing the 200 miles to the Beach in early October might just be a stretch right now?!?!?!

At least I got in a super 200k over the weekend with some really nice folks.

Check out the swelling on my right hip, football sized! The doctor indicated that the outer layer of skin had separated from the fatty tissue underneath and all the blood was pooling there. It was a really hard blow and bounce off the asphalt!! He went ahead and installed a drain/pump to remove the blood.


Huge hematoma on my right hip


Knee road rash


Road rash on my right hip right elbow prettysad looking


Right elbow pretty sad looking


Drain pump


Elbow and chunk out of my chin


Drain post hip replacement


Right now morphine is my friend!!

Ouch I’m glad you are relatively OK. Bummer about hip replacement you are in excellent shape so I would bet recovery and return to the bike on or before schedule.

Good luck and a fast recovery Jppe.

AMEN!

Trying to get on the Xray table from the wheelchair was very rough. I lucked out and had a male technician who did his best to help me get on by slowly lifting my leg. That was the worst and most painful of the experience thus far. He even went at lengths to put the X-ray machine in different positions to avoid me having to move around. He even went out of his way to go get a hospital bed and create an opening in an ER examination room. That way he could just slide me over from the table to the bed to avoid getting back in the wheelchair. I was shaking uncontrollably from the pain while on the table. The best words were him saying “I’m finished with the X-rays”.

Then a little later I got the worst words from the ER Doctor .....we already have X-rays of your hip but we need more of your femur. I felt like crying!!!

Then there was a CAT Scan of my head and neck. Those ladies were a Rough!! They were able to slide me around while I was lying on the sheet but doing it fast was a higher priority than comfort from them.

My anesthesiaologist for my sugery gave me a choice of rolling me around before I went under or afterwards for a nerve block. I emphatically told him to knock me out first!!!

Most of my medical team have been very helpful in moving me around and minimizing the pain. It’s just one or two of them that fell off of my Christmas list for their lack of empathy!!!

Vic, my ortho said 6-8 weeks for a stationary bike. I asked him when I could get back on the road and he just smiled and said “we’ll see”. He senses my desire and aptitude but is just being cautious which I’m fine with. We’ve had a lot of discussions and he’s going to steer me straight. I’m not worried how long it might take as time is still on my side. What I don’t look forward to is the conditioning loss and regaining whatever form I can get back to. There’s a lot more work involved in rebuilding than maintaining!!!