The Setback

Thursday started out as a nice morning Bill and I set off to meet with Stacy for our 60 mile ride. Things were going well, blue skys, not too cold and lots of other riders out.

Stacy and I were cruising along about 15-16 mph side by side when I realized there was a wood post at the intersection that I was heading straight for. My mind was thinking how to get out of the inevitable within the next second. I couldnt go left as Stacy was next to me and next to her the center metal pole, I couldnt go right as there was a metal cable, so I tried to just move alittle to the left not to hit it head on....it worked or so I thought until my pedal clipped the wood pole, causing me to lose control....so the fall began.

Although its a matter of a second my mind was already thinking "how bad is this going to be and how much will it hurt." At that moment my left elbow struck the ground so hard I swear I heard the break, then my head hit the ground and I stopped sliding. My brand new helmet did its job, but I screamed in pain as I knew my arm/elbow wasnt right.

After my initial screaming, I realized Stacy was there and yelled to her to go get my husband as I thought my arm was broken. Stacy took off like it was a time trial race :) Another few bikers came up, took care of my gear and called 911. Great group of riders that were sympathtic and willing to help.

Stacy and Bill came back and directed the ambulance to my side as well as called Eric to help with our gear. My first official ambulance ride, not related to my prior law enforcement career. The fire medics were awesome and helpful even though I was embarassed to be using their services.

I get to Mercy-Folsom and the nurses see my TDL jersey and say "hey we had one of those yesterday", yes Jason Weckworth the founder of TDL took a spill the day before, although I'm sure his was on a tougher ride.

So the doctor comes in, looks at my elbow and says, "oh yeah thats broken, but lets take x-rays." X-rays taken and confirm a break, he says I will need a screw put in but I need wait for the swelling to go down and see an orthopedic surgeon.

Dang everyone is saying RAAM is over for me, but I'm not convinced yet. I want to get the screw put in so I can get on the trainer and keep my conditioning up. I've done too many miles and stressed too much about fundraising and making a difference for this not to happen. Right now I can only ice and elevate which is a step in healing. Wednesday I see the Orthopedic surgeon and you know I'll be telling him he only has 6 weeks to fix me :)

Anyway, I thank Stacy, Eric, Tucker and Bill for their positive words at the hospital and hope to ride soon.

As I'm typing this (one handed) Bill and Stacy are out for a cold morning ride in the hills of El Dorado....I am with them in spirit!!!

Taking one for the team...

We all know what the term means. It usually involves an act that promotes a team spirit or helps the team reach its overall goal. With my team in mind I stood in the quiet of my house razor in hand. I wanted to be as masculine I could about this so I thought about the scene from Rambo. The one where he wasn’t exactly willing to go with the program in getting cleaned up so they decided to “shave him dry”. No, I didn’t have flashbacks of being in a Vietcong prison camp and flip out when the razor got close. I just thought good lord that would really hurt. Ok, so the 10 on the manly scale was a bit much. What about the other end of the spectrum? After all this was my first time so I might as make it memorable. But it would have taken me forever to find enough candles and wait for the bubble bath to fill up. Let alone finding and charging my ipod to put on some Celine Dion. If I went that route, and especially if word got out, I would never get my man card back! So I settled for as high on the man scale one could go while shaving his legs. While there were no candles or bubble bath I don’t think there is any higher you can go than 2. 1 being candles and bubbles, then it pretty much can go to 10. That’s it. What I am saying is there is just no manly way to do it. So with shaver in hand I took one for the team to make me a little faster. I also have to say that my dog, Howie, follows me everywhere through the house. Even for the moments I am in the bathroom, if he isn’t sleeping, he will follow me and lay down outside the door. As I removed the wind

drag from my legs. I looked over at Howie, who of course was watching my every move.

He seemed to hang his head and looked away. I knew what he was thinking. I stepped down from the pedestal he held me on. I am no longer the Alpha dog, the leader of the pack, at least not with silky smooth legs. Hopefully one day he will regard me in high esteem again and we can look back on this day and laugh. So for my team I have punched a hole in my man card, and lowered my position in my dog’s world. But man I am going to have some tan legs on this trip!

Fundraising

Joining Team Donate Life Organ Re-cyclers was the easy part. Fundraising has been the challenging part. Many of my friends and family have rallied behind us and are helping us along in some many ways. One of them is my friend Becky who
I met about 6 years ago while working in the Pediatric ICU at Children's Hospital in Madera, CA. Becky loves to bake and recently helped a co-worker raise funds for the Aids Life Cycle by selling cupcakes. I asked her if she would like to continue to bake her yummy cupcakes but this time to help raise funds for Team Donate Life. She was happy to help. So last week she baked cupcakes and I sold them at Tom's two home baseball games. (Tom along with the many miles he cycles he also coaches the Junior Varsity baseball team at Yosemite High School in Oakhurst). The cupcake sale was a great success. But what I didn't know there was a family in the stands who was personally touched by organ donation. This mother whose son Tom coached two years ago came immediately up to me after setting up and said I am going to write you a check. In my mind I am thinking - you are going to write me a check for a $2 cupcake. But to my surprise the check wasn't for $2 it was for $100 "Thank you for what you are doing, my sister just received a liver transplant and is doing great." Yes the fundraising is difficult, but oh so very worth it.
Organ Donation the gift of life.

Georgetown Loop Ride

So Sunday my husband, Bill and I decide to do a long ride with some elevation. I decided I would pick the ride, because he always chooses long boring rides that seem difficult for my level. So we decide on the Georgetown loop, I figured it would be tough as this is my longest ride to date, 70 miles. It was difficult for me to say the least, I felt pretty good going up Marshall grade, but then it seemed like getting to Georgetown was everlasting, ever little incline starting taking it's toll and I kept thinking, it's just around this corner, but it wasn't. I started getting nauseous but, Bill was ahead of me so I didn't want to get to far behind him. Finally we get to Georgetown gas station and I felt wiped out!!! Which most people know that when your tired, you get emotional and you play mental games with yourself. I even thought of calling my daughter to come get me. I was only 1/2 way through the 70 miles. I drank a soda and it calmed my nausea down so I figured I'd try a few more miles and see how it went. The next several miles were fast and at a decline so I started to perk back up. Then a few more inclines and it was starting to get pretty windy so I started to struggle again, mostly in my mind. I kept wondering what I was thinking signing up to Race Across America? I'm not a cyclist, I've always been a runner, but not great at that either. Then I remember that I'm not doing this to be a professional athlete, I'm doing this because I believe strongly that Organ Donation saves lifes!!! At Salmon Falls rode I was feeling normal again. I loved all the S curves downhill, it was the most fun part of the ride. But with every decline there comes an incline, by now we only had about 15 miles to get home so I stuck with it and got up those hills. By know means was I speedy, but I rode for 51/2 hours and hit my personal best of 70 miles. Exhausted but not Defeated!!!

I wish it was Monday...

Yeah, you don't hear that very often. I was waking Chloe up for school this morning (Tuesday) and in a groggy voice, with her eyes still closed, she said "I wish it was Friday". I had to laugh as I walked out to get her a waffle with peanut butter and a sprinkle of powdered sugar. Ok, so my daughter knows what she wants and as a dad I know it's healthier than any kids cereal out there. I think the comment was funny to me because it came from my 7 year old... not a teenager, not a college student, and not a career oriented middle age woman. She was already wishing it was Friday.

My second reaction was "I wish it was Monday." You see Mondays are my "Saturdays" or, my first day off work. Being in public safety you don't get the luxury of a 9-5 Monday through Friday schedule. I wouldn't want it anyway. I have never had a job with those hours and probably never will. My work days are quite long 12.5 hours so there isn't much to get done before or after work unless I want to skip seeing the family for a solid 3 days. That's not going to happen so any amount of training on those days is squeezed in before work (4 AM) or after, and now with daylight savings time this is more reasonable. But still, on those work days, trying to train immediately affects the amount of time with Stacy and the kids.

So that leaves 4 days of training and that is more than enough you might say. Well let's take a look at exhibit A, our calendar mounted on our fridge. As you can see there is quite the color scheme. So taking into consideration, shift work for me (all weekend and part of the week) the occasional court dates, training dates, Stacy working the 4 days of my "weekend", Chloe school, softball, swim practice, fund raising events, birthday parties and doctor appointments, it's quite full. NOW we can start plugging in not 1 person training but 2, and as much as we'd like to pack a lunch for the kids and let them watch a scooby doo marathon so we can ride together, that's not going to happen. Maybe in 5-10 years.

I would love to say that training for RAAM is only physically challenging, but that is the least of it. I believe the hardest part is getting the chance to train. Once your out the door and clipped in you can let it all out. But training and keeping sight of what else matters in your life is a huge undertaking. I think that is what is going to help us succeed. Knowing that for 6-7 days we are only responsible for staying in the saddle and peddling forward. The only deadline looming is a TDL dinner on day 7 (no pressure but I plan on being there).

Mondays have been the days I am able to ride with other TDL members. It kind of sets the tone for the week for me. The first real ride as all the others will have been either very short or on the trainer during my work week. So Friday morning at 4 AM as I roll out of bed I am sure that if my daughter heard me she would ask "Daddy, why do you wish it was Monday?"

A day filled with awesome people

(written on Sunday)

Today Eric and I met up with Bill Kelly, Connor & Jared Ellison, Chris Morris from TDL’s Live Forever Team and Chris Salcone for the Sunday coffee ride. I hadn’t met either Chris before so that was fun. I didn’t get a chance to chat to Chris Morris much, but I got to learn a bit about Chris Salcone and his amazing son Luca. At just 17 months, Luca received a liver transplant from a 7 year old donor. Chris and his wife, Katie took him into the hospital because he had been vomiting all night. After many tests and waiting, six days later he received a liver transplant. He is now home and he and his family are adjusting to their new life. I am looking forward to meeting Luca and his mom, Katie. What an awesome family!

Within the first few miles we saw our friend Kaci running along the bike trail. A few years ago, Kaci’s husband, Kevin had a horrible motorcycle accident and needed many blood transfusions to save his life. Since then they host an annual blood drive at Blood Source. Another awesome family!

After the coffee ride ended Eric and I continued our ride. We were lucky enough to have my parents watch the kids this weekend so we took advantage of some kid free time and took a long ride. We headed towards Sacramento on the bike trail. Once we passed the Nimbus Fish Hatchery we started seeing the TDL running group out on their Sunday run. First we saw Janet who was almost finished with her 5 mile run. She is a very good friend who happened to work at the dialysis clinic I went to for treatment. She and her husband David also have “crewed” for the past two years for CIM. Then we saw Roxie who ran on a TDL relay team last year in CIM. As we were talking with her we heard someone yell, “Team Donate Life,” as they passed us on their bike. It was Lee who is crewing for Team 4 Hope. Then we went a little further and saw Cayden, who is our Team Captain and Billy who ran on a TDL relay team in last years CIM. We then saw our friend Candi who ran her longest run ever…8 miles. Woohoo! Finally we got going on our ride again. A few miles further we saw another TDL runner, Chelsea. She also ran her furthest distance of 16 miles. I was so excited to see so many people out on the trails that support TDL and then to know that some of those people were running further than they ever thought they would. AWESOME!

Eric and I ended up riding 60 miles today. The furthest either of us has ridden. I know we still need to put in many longer rides than that before RAAM, but we are ready! Before we know it we will be doing 100 miles for one ride. Yep, we’re pretty awesome too. :)

Sacrifice

Every so often I get updates from the RAAM facebook page about another entrant to the race. I am in awe of the number and athleticism of the solo riders. I think this year must be a record. I have also taken a glance at the pages of several of the teams. They are pure athletes in their own right with coaches, sponsors, lengthy race backgrounds and a pure love of cycling. I see them holding their arms up in victory during past races. They ride what can only be described as Ferraris on two wheels. They have trained years and apply all that they have learned, hardened muscles and efficient hearts honed to their limits, to participate in a grueling 3000 mile race.

Then I think of Stacy and I.

We started riding bikes in September, on borrowed bikes at that. We’re not cyclists. Don’t get me wrong, we’re getting better, but what drives us is this idea that organ donation saves lives. That’s it. I think of the time that professional riders put into their bikes and bodies. I always wonder what I would do with that much time. While trying to train for this race have they been through any surgeries? Have their kids been hospitalized? Do they work 40 plus hours on weekends and holidays? Are they trying to balance a budget when deciding what kind of gear they can afford? Are they struggling getting others to donate to their cause? Then, and after going through any of what I have listed, do they find the energy to push themselves to get on a trainer when the kids are asleep, or ride to and from work to add precious miles?

Don’t get me wrong. The professional cyclist has worked extremely hard to get to the level of competition they desire and I do admire that. But I also know that everyone on my team has made just as many sacrifices with their time and energy to highlight our cause of organ donation awareness. It’s not just putting miles on the road. It is touching peoples hearts, balancing work, kids, budgets, health, and still pushing physically to ride with some of the best cyclists in the world. So to my "blue collar team" I wish you the best in your training and hope the other parts of your life are safe, healthy and stress free.

EB