Woe is me!

At Cardiff airport waiting for my flight home on Tuesday evening, one of the lads from the team shouldered me, playfully but hard, with his right shoulder into the back of my bad left one. Idiot forgot about my fractured clavical. I was feeling great before the incident. I was gaining my full mobility in my left arm pain free and was no longer requiring analgesia. Well after that I was in alot of pain. I shrugged it off and he was extremely apologetic. I think it frightened him more then me but since then I've been waking up in the mornings with savage pain and back on regular analgesia.

Today I was setting up the bike on the turbo, ready for a full on turbo session, when I was tying up my hair and mid-way I heard a huge crack from my left clavical. The pain was instant. I couldn't bring my arm back down. I forced it down and the pain shot right through my chest. I screamed and cried. I knew I had just re-broken it. I sat on the sofa craddling my left arm in my right, crying hysterically. I have now gone backwards in my injury and I was hoping to be back on the road bike by the end of the week. In my mind I knew that wasn't going to happen. I honestly believe that if so-and-so didn't shoulder me, it wouldn't of weakened the bone and cause it to simply re-crack by just tying up my hair up, especially 3 weeks post orginal injury.

I went straight to a private hospital where I know the officail Olympic doctor works and got it x-rayed. Sure enough there is a crack in my calvical but they couldn't tell if it was the old one or this new one that I now claim. All I know is that I am in pain that I didn't have before. So the Doc said that realistically I have 4 weeks preperation before the race in Beijing to start competing competively again. I cried. 4 weeks!?!? How the feck does anyone become race fit in the space of 4 weeks?!?!

Now I have to tell my manager and coach the situation and get reviewed by the appointed Paralympic doctor if I will be fit to compete. The way I'm feeling I'm thinking that will be a long shot. I rang Catherine today and told her the news. She's a qualified physiotherapist and even though she told me not to worry I could hear the doubt in her voice. I know this is also as important if not more important to her as it is to me and she is relying in me big time. We are a team and we know each other so well from competing the past two years. It will be hard to replace me as a pilot because you need to be able to read each others moves and react simultaneously to any sudden moves in the road race. And if I do lose my place I will also lose my sports grant from the government and any private sponsorship we have gotten. Bollox. I need a miracle.

And this blog was supposed to be a happy one about racing and me training and waffling about going to Beijing Paralympics. Turning out to be a right fecking unintentional drama queen!

Turbo Tart

So this has become my regular set up, popping the bike on the turbo, face at tv, find suitable music channel and sweat more then I've pee-ed in the past week, YUM!

I'm 3 weeks today since my accident and I haven't taken the bike out on the road yet. It's hard to keep the head high when you're not racing and the Paralympics are looming around the corner. I feel now that I might just be going to participate and not compete. I was meant to be going to Madrid this Friday to do a 2 day tandem race but my manager asked another girl to do the job for me without telling me. Still though I did get the final selection and I have officially been selected to compete with Catherine.

To add to this my coach has not been answering my emails and queries on turbo training, so I am forced to make this up myself. Now I've been competing for a number of years without coaching and I feel I have a fair bit of knowledge but it would be nice to bounce ideas back and forth with someone.

But one thing I have to say is the support I am getting from the cycling community has been amazing. I got emails from people I would only know from racing, well wishes from different clubs then my own and the track cycling commission of Ireland also sent me well wishes. I got fantastic emails of support from the internet community too. That makes me so happy. There are some great folks out there.

Ha I'm just after reading back on my last post! I was high on Tylex. That's my excuse for the bad spelling and grammar!!

Clavical x-ray

The bike in front of me clipped the wheel ahead of it and hit the deck. I could of gone around only that there was a van coming up the other side of the road... and it wasn't all that long ago I hit one of those. The only choice I had was to treat my full carbon sexy bike like a mountain bike and hop over the fallen bike and avoid the decked cyclist. Well i knocked myself out cold. Supposedly when I woke up, being a nurse, I was telling the crowd what to do in medical terms! Haha! Don't remember that!

Into an ambulance and off to hospital. Broken collar bone and a few bruises, scraps and concussion. I met the other cyclist there. The van unfortunetly rolled over their foot and the thing was the size of a melon. It could of been worse for me when I saw that, luckly I didn't choice the option to go around them.

So off the bike now for 4 weeks... I'm gonna make that 3. Turbo training all the way and no races for a month ): I hope I will be fit enough for Beijing.