Know Your Limits
Well, I must admit I'm extremely lucky. Last Wednesday, during my camping trip, I had a mountain biking accident. All things considered, I came out better than I deserved.
With some family friends, we all drove up the Kimberley ski hill in BC. The plan was to ride down and get ice cream, not a hospital trip. While going down the hill, I was probably going a good 60km/h. With my turn coming up, I grabbed the brakes. Well, long story short, my back wheel locked up and the bike and I flew over the curb. At that time, 50km/h wouldn't be an unreasonable guess. My landing wasn't the softest either, diving headfirst into boulders, about 10 feet down. Even though I suffered no head injuries, my memory of those 35-40 feet in the air is foggy. I just remember being pretty spooked. However, my sister and I deduced by my injuries that I must've done a (pretty sloppy) shoulder roll to break my fall. I guess 12 years of instinct can really come in handy at times like this.
To say the least, I was lucky. All I suffered was a sprained left wrist (which is almost healed by now), a bruised hip (it's recovering nicely), and a buckle fracture in my right forearm. For those of you that don't know, (I sure didn't until Wednesday), a buckle fracture is when the bone gets compressed and buckles outwards, not breaking at all. I'd say these are pretty minor when you consider I could've been injured infinitely worse had things gone slightly different. As well, I'm indirectly lucky in the sense that I now have something to blog about! I know it's nothing to be proud of, just a silver lining of an injury.
Needless to say, I won't be mountain biking down any ski hills anytime soon. I've learned my lesson and know my limits. It might be difficult to see, but this is the X-ray of my arm.
With some family friends, we all drove up the Kimberley ski hill in BC. The plan was to ride down and get ice cream, not a hospital trip. While going down the hill, I was probably going a good 60km/h. With my turn coming up, I grabbed the brakes. Well, long story short, my back wheel locked up and the bike and I flew over the curb. At that time, 50km/h wouldn't be an unreasonable guess. My landing wasn't the softest either, diving headfirst into boulders, about 10 feet down. Even though I suffered no head injuries, my memory of those 35-40 feet in the air is foggy. I just remember being pretty spooked. However, my sister and I deduced by my injuries that I must've done a (pretty sloppy) shoulder roll to break my fall. I guess 12 years of instinct can really come in handy at times like this.
To say the least, I was lucky. All I suffered was a sprained left wrist (which is almost healed by now), a bruised hip (it's recovering nicely), and a buckle fracture in my right forearm. For those of you that don't know, (I sure didn't until Wednesday), a buckle fracture is when the bone gets compressed and buckles outwards, not breaking at all. I'd say these are pretty minor when you consider I could've been injured infinitely worse had things gone slightly different. As well, I'm indirectly lucky in the sense that I now have something to blog about! I know it's nothing to be proud of, just a silver lining of an injury.
Needless to say, I won't be mountain biking down any ski hills anytime soon. I've learned my lesson and know my limits. It might be difficult to see, but this is the X-ray of my arm.
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