Friday, July 13, 2007

Friday the 13th!

Ok, I'm not superstitious, but here's my day so far:
-Make plans to go DH riding with Feldman at Keystone. So far so good.
-Arrive at Keystone only to discover that my shock pump is broken. We try Feldman's pump and manage to pull the valve entirely out of my Roco air shock. Great. Thankfully, a shop in the village (more on them later) has a pump and lets us use it. Whew.
-First run, Feldman flats, and I break my old ESP9.0 derailleur into tiny plastic pieces. I limp down the remainder of the run and head to the shop again.
-The cheapest SRAM derailleur available at the shop is a $60 X.7. This is the same derailler that I sell for $30 or something to frame customers, but it's a retail shop in the mountains, so whatever. They gotta mark stuff up to make a buck. Whatever.
-My feelings toward the shop take a nosedive when I realize that my derailleur cable is horribly frayed from the abuse of finishing the run, and that I need a new one. Now, I can buy a derailleur cable for 50 cents, or 30 cents if I buy them in bulk. And I *just bought* a $60 derailleur. So I go in and ask for a cable, and the guy says "that'll be $5". $5 for a derailleur cable. Fantastic.
-Feeling better, Feldman and I do a few great runs with no mechanicals. The new trails are wicked - especially the new jump trail, "Money". I manage to cleanly jump all the jumps over the course of 2 or 3 runs, though not every jump each time. Super, super fun 15 foot tables with nice steep takeoffs. Wicked.
-On my final run of the day, we head down "Wild Thing", the one and only decent trail to get to the bottom of the mountain. This is the fourth time I've ridden it. It's relatively easy, I think to myself. Then I plant my front wheel sideways on a rock, burp the air out of the tire, and fly over the bars. I land SUPER hard on my left shoulder. Did I mention that I didn't bother to bring my full upper body armor (with shoulder cups) because it's going to just be a mellow day? Yeah. I can't lift my left arm above my shoulder, so I've either bruised it really really badly (I'm crossing my fingers hoping for this option) or separated it (doh!). If it's the latter, I'll be off the bike for a couple of months. We'll see.
-I break my minipump fixing the flat, and also break the valve on my tubeless rimstrip. Then I crash again due to the bum shoulder on the way to the bottom. Fantastic.

So not a great Friday for me. As a final insult, someone took the Snickers bar I'd stashed under the car (so that it wouldn't melt) as an after-ride treat. Doh!

I'll know more about the shoulder in a day or two. I don't think it'll slow me down too much for working, at least.

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

walt that entire episode sounds terrible, especially the bit about someone stealing your snickers - but at least you have that fantastic story to show for it - hope you are okay!

Walt said...

Yeah, the snickers was the ultimate insult. I mean, if it had just been lying on the ground in some random spot, fine. But shouldn't it be obvious why it was 2 feet UNDER a car?

Guess I'll just let it melt next time. :(

On the plus side, my shoulder kinda lets me type, so I don't have to hunt and peck with just my right hand...

John said...

Ouch! What a day! Sometimes insult and injury seem to go together all too well...