Hip Resurfacing In India

July 23, 1995: The Wreck

Mountain bike racing has more-or-less consumed all my spare time for about 6 years now. I just (One month ago) won my first national series race (Norba national CC 35+ at Vail, CO). I'm leading the Colorado Off-Road Points Series (CORPS), 35+. Today is Sunday. Today's race is the long leg of a 2-day weekend, I won the dirt crit. yesterday in a sprint. The start is fast, maybe a bit too fast. We climb for about 1 minute before a 20-30 minute downhill into our first of two big loops. I get the hole shot over the top and put on the gas. We negotiate a few sliding hairpins and then head into a semi-steep straight-away with some large rollers. Hit the first roller at high speed and when I'm in the air, my pedal unclips. Stupid *@$#@ pedals, too much mud early in the season wore them down. Land it OK, but then hit another. This time I'm going faster, and leave the ground with only one foot on the pedals, seated on the saddle... I start a slow airborne flip, land on my upper-back at speed and start rolling.

I come to a stop in a seated position. Check for feeling in the legs. Check. Look for road rash. Yea, some but not too much. Damn my hip hurts, as does my back. I stand up. Everything OK. But not good enough to continue. I straddle the bike and limp back to first aid. They patch me up and we pack up for home. We have a 4 hour drive ahead of us.

I just couldn't get comfortable the entire trip home. We go to the ER at a walk-in clinic at home and get the word "I don't know much about hips, but I do know they're supposed to be in one piece. We're calling an ambulance to take you to the hospital." Of course I respond, "Oh no you're not, we just drove 4 hrs, we can drive ourselves to the hospital." I broke out in tears for a minute or so because the qualification race for the World Championships was only 2 weeks away. I wouldn't make it.

We were met at the Hospital by a wheelchair and I was admitted overnight. While my hip wasn't bad enough to require surgery, I was told I'd be on crutches for 6 weeks, from there we'd see how it went. "You may develop arthritis in the hip, time will tell." Well, this is how it went: I accidentally put full weight on my leg about a week later and it didn't hurt.

I was back racing in 3 weeks. Just missed winning the CO title by 1 spot, but did win the last big race of the year.

posted by Russell Kappius @ 11:35 AM