The Crash
As you probably saw on the Twitter/Facebook feed I had a bad crash that involved me breaking a leg. Well, slightly cracking my leg.The morning was mainly a slight drizzle the entire way. The roads were good the entire way (until the last bit). I was heading west on Pettibone and was turning right onto Cochran (yes, the last turn... ). This turn was slippery. I'm guessing that there was a bit od diesel that was dropped by one of the trucks that frequent the area that floated to the top. I started the turn and about half way through the turn both my wheels went out from under me. I had been going around 20-25 mph at the time - though it was the landing part that got me, not the speed I think.The entire way I was in the lead pack of the ride. The pack consisted of me and two other riders -- Howard and a man in yellow rain gear. We were averaging around 18mph the whole way which was a pretty damn good pace.Both of them stopped when I hit the deck. Howard commented that he had almost gone down turning around it was so slippery. After a 30-second system check I gingerly remounted the bike and kept going and mostly kept pace with them on the way back up the hill to the start/finish area. Then I rode another 2-1/2 miles back home.On a broken leg. That count's for serious bragging rights. Frickin' hardcore!Ok... truth be told if I knew that I had broken my leg I wouldn't have kept going. It felt like just a hard hit and nothing more. I've fallen before and nothing like this had happened. I was having trouble putting weight onto my right leg, but my initial thought was that the muscle had a hella lot of stress on it and given the situation I wasn't surprised.I took a shower to wash out the road rash and took some Advil and a nap. We went to the BMW Motorcycles dealer for lunch at their open house and came back. My limp was getting far worse -- as was the pain. This was the point that I decided to have it checked out.At the urgent care they took my vitals. By blood pressure was 110/62! Woohoo! At least that part of me is good. The doc poked and prodded a bit then I had a series of 9 X-rays done. That's more than I've had in 20 years.The doctor came back and broke the news. There was a small chip/minor crack in my femoral neck. I don't have a copy of the plates, but here's basically what he described:
It's enough to cause rubbing and pain. He was pretty cavalier about it about how he didn't think it looked that bad. This makes me a bit happy. :-) From doing a bit of digging this gets classified as a compression fracture.My knee and the rest of my femur were also included in a bunch of the images. Thankfully there was no damage to anything else. Nothing beyond a good whack that's going to leave a mark.They issued me a pair of crutches and set me up with an appointment for Tuesday with an orthopedist in Twinsburg.Like the saying goes, it didn't happen if you don't have pictures.(if you get all faint at the slight of blood, you might just want to look away before scrolling down too much further... just sayin' )
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