progress 07-29-09

66 days out from surgery and i am walking-no walking cast (but heels on both feet are sore..especially left heel) or crutches!

Physical therapy is going well. this morning was the first morning back on a bike. the leg was feeling a whole lot like jello this morning while peddling the stationary bike. working on strength of pretty much every muscle from my hip down.

not as frustrated as i was a month ago, but i am still anxious to get back out on the dirt. good thing it is the hottest day in recorded oregon history...supposed to be 108. if the ac in the house won't cool below 80...it's hot outside! Let's go to vegas for a cool down eh?

the battle continues

well, it has been 58 days since the snapped achilles tendon. I am frustrated, bored, tired of staring at my computer screen.....

the first picture is from about a week after the surgery. I went in to be charged another $500 and get a new cast after the first one was filled with post surgery ooze. The second picture is of my ankle about two minutes ago. still a scar, but not much swelling and not quite as frankenstein looking as the first one.

I am making progres....slow progress...but progress. I am regaining flexibility in the ankle, the achilles is firming up and most swelling is gone.

Enough about my leg...I have been able to get out to a few mountain bike related events. The first I went to recent was the Black Rock Demo Day. Just about every bike company that makes a burly bike was there: Felt, Diamond Back, Kona, Evil, Norco...the only guys that were not there was Transition. I thought that was kind of a lame move on their part! There are so many transition riders in the area....just seems like they do not care about the local market??? Maybe I am wrong.

I am a bit bummed that Raul and his buddies from Venezuela are on their way to Whistler as I type. I was supposed to go on the trip, but due to my leg and no money....I sit here typing.

Physical therapy is going well. I have another appointment tomorrow morning and I am excited to go and work this thing out. I wish they had a machine that they could hook up to my leg and make it back how it was before I tried to snap it in half!

I am looking forward to the day I post my first post surgery jump picture!!!!

spring time riding

well, it has been a long time since i posted on the old blog. i've been doing a lot of spring riding...mostly at post canyon. you have to ride post when it's not covered in snow. my buddy mike from vancouve b.c. came down and rode a couple day...so long story short, spring riding has been great. so much riding that i haven't been taking any pictures. the camera has been collecting dust!

I did forget about this day that dirk took some sweek pictures. Lighting and fog was perfect for taking pictures.

A couple weeks ago we planned to go out and ride one of the local downhill trails. the first four runs down were great! we then had a bb que and hung out before riding after the lunch break. on this run i had a fun little injury. after casing one of the jumps i ruptured my right achilles tendon. so i guess this blog is kinda turning into my recovery blog instead of my riding blog? I'm having surgery this coming friday the 5th and i'm not sure how long i will be down after that. I'm gonna give this thing hell and be back healthier and stronger than before!

11-23-08-BLACKROCK

Went to Blackrock on Sunday with Derek, Darren and Argyle.

on the way down, the sky looked sweet and the sun was coming up. We met up with whiplash, josh, doney show, some of the young brothers raul and agony rob.

The trail conditions were great considering all the rain we have had recently.

Darren was showing us powty. This was his first time back to Blackrock since like May, so it was good to have him back.

Derek goochered up his leg pretty good on one of the sunday stroll ramps.

The camp had some extra money for a big fancy sign...probably to keep out the bikers!

The door man at this restaurant was pretty aggro looking. we decided not to go there, but go to mexican food back in dallas....mexican food is always good after the ride!

The day was great other than a couple small crashes. Argyle went down hard on sunday stroll just before derek crashed.

We go to post next week!

11-16-08-Syncline

Well, we did Syncline part two yesterday and it was awesome! the weather was even better than it was last weekend, the crew was bigger and the ride was crazier!

when jake was doing his morning download, i did the following:

the morning started at jake's house, i found this little figurine guy and a bowl of nuts. i made it look like the guy was throwing the nuts and left them all over the kitchen. he threw them, not me! this guy looks like trouble.

jake had a new set of wheels built...see below. tubeless and i of course predicted three times that he would have some type of trouble with them. what do you know, he had three problems with them. i am a tubeless tire see the future guy.we picked up derek on the side of the road and a guy mike followed us out there. when i snapped this shot, i was talking on the phone, taking the picture and driving while drinking coffee. talk about multi tasking!when we arrived, the crew was waiting and ready to head up to the top of the hill!

let's see if i can list all in attendance. me, mike (trick master), jake, andy, derek, the guys from chris king, johnny thunder, dirk, robholio, jason word, raul, chris calmeth coven, his buddy, kevin, his buddy the new guy, fat larry and skinny april. not sure if i missed anybody, but i'm sure they will pop up in a picture somewhere. i'm sorry if i missed you! i don't think there was anybody there named the tim.

raul had his new camera rockin this run, i haven't seen much of the footage, but i'm sure it will be great!and oh yes, team aggro was in attendance! they we a bit hard to see. their jerseys were syncline camo.

i got this shot of kevin as he was passing me towards the bottom of the hill. i thought it looked cool???this was one of the chris king guys before he ate poop.

kevin had a wimpy crash . no blood or lost teeth. he seemed awful happy and pleasant about crashing. i seem to alway be pretty pissed when i crash and get fired up for the riding. no injuries on the day. robholio didn't even break himself on coyote canyon. we did three runs with a bunch of people at syncline and then a few of us went over to post and did a couple runs around family maing. i think we are going to try and go to blackrock this coming weekend! i got some ok footage yesterday, but i hope to have the cable camera ready for next weekend at the blackrockS!

11-09-08-Syncline

Got up early this morning and headed over to Fat Larry and Skinny April's house in Hillsboro. We rode out through the normal horrible weather on the west side and out through Portland. When we met up with Josh, Raul and Carlisle in Troutdale, the weather was still looking bad! From there i jumped in with argyle and i joke on the way out that the weather would start to get better at cascade locks.....and what do you know, it got better at cascade locks! from there the rain got lighter and lighter until we arrived at the hood river bridge and could see blue skies over the bingen side!

This video was taken on the first run. i think we were all shocked at how dry it was. We did run into donkey show and mrs. donkey show about half way down the first run. they didn't want to shuttle with us, so they only got in a couple "laps" but i'm not sure where they were riding. we met up with a guy justin that i've ridden with a bit out at blackrock...super fast racer guy, but won't really hit any jumps.

the weather was great, we nearly killed some xc riders that thought it was a good idea to stop in the middle of the trail on a downhill section, just around a blind corner. i think each of us had a near smash the guy in spankex experience around that corner. some people have no common sense on where to stop.

raul and i did a bit of filming with his new camera and we may have gotten a few keepers from todays ride. next weekend we have the drunkfest/bike fest 2008 back in syncline. until then...

oh, i also got the old mint green 888 re painted by mormon craig...it looks sweet!

10-26-08 post canyon

post was great today. i picked up raul and his new camera at about eight o'clock this morning and headed east. the drive out was crazy windy. one of the windiest days i've seen on the way to hood river.

we started at family man where josh quickly introduced his head to a tree and he was then seeing crazy! he took a few advil and we headed towards the top of the mountain. the riding was going fine...new guy brian from the east coast lost one of the pulleys on his rear changer at the first jump. we rigged some wire together and he rode the rest of the day on it!

we made the usual stop at the chorus jumps where everybody was coming up short on jumps. robholio cased the second booter on the right side and still went for the third one...boy was that a bad mistake! he exploded his rear wheel and goochered his gnar pretty good. i think there was some blood coming from the junk after that crash. there was a huge divot in the laning of #3 where #hoolio hit it. a guy from hood river was supposed to bring him a wheel, but i never again saw rob or the guy with the replacement wheel.

we saw a bunch of other guys with broken wheels, broken forks and hurt bodies...it was one of the weirdest days out there.

when we were driving up, we noticed a new trail that somebody had carved into a hillside of a recent logging operation. so we had to hit it....boy was this trail steep. it was very soft dirt and went straight down the side of a hill!

after the ride, terry and josh headed home; brian and todd m headed home.....raul and i headed to cascade locks for some of the best pizza i've ever had...sorry paddington's and walking man. the oregon pizza...we finished a large between the two of us. it sounds gross, but it was salmon and shrimp pizza with cheese and maybe mushrooms. GOOD FOOD!

i'm not sure how many more days we will have to ride post canyon this year, but today was one of the best weather days out there! we have blackrock to look forward to all winter!