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Some frustration!

by Carl Brewer last modified 2007-12-03 16:43
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It's been a testing time ...

There's a couple of things that are keeping me a bit frustrated at the moment.  The obvious one is the rib injury - as Dino can empathise, it's bloody annoying.  Around now I was expecting to hit some form and start to be more of an influential rider in the B grade races at BBN track, but that's racing, and I just have to deal with it. I've been getting around a little on the new '08 Trek Fuel EX8 which is a delightful dualie, and makes riding with rib injuries possible for sustained times, but it's no substitute for getting low and flaying my legs in sprint training. C'est la Vie ... In the overall scheme of things it's really a minor thing.  I managed to at least start all three races at Blackburn on Saturday and even actually finished the Keirin (w00t! 8 laps!) despite not being able to hold the wheel at least I ended up on the same lap.

So that's ok, under the circumstances.  I needed to be getting some more real miles in to shed some of these excess kilos, but it'll come once I'm healed. I won't be walking up CRB hill next time at Hotham in February. That was a real wakeup call.

I'm disappointed in the turnup for the Trek Summer Sprint Series.  There's a bunch of reasons (Stu Vaughan was out riding his fixie to Albury(!) for example and teh Llama was at Bright doing some enduro thing) but still having only 7 riders was really not what I was hoping for. We were hoping to get a few good A graders (Eddie Wilson, Stu Vaughan, Barry Woods etc) and while Jeremy Mclay showed up we had no-one to push him and I think for him it would have been a bit of a flat afternoon.  All of us who've worked a lot to make it happen want to see more people actually racing the program.  There's a lot of people who're racing lower grades who would also have a great time, if only they'd just have a go.  All the feedback we get from riders actually doing it is overwhelmingly positive.  Just, they don't bring their friends. 

It's a small racing field and it has to be (30 riders max) so we're really sensitive when numbers are down, and if you're thinking of coming, we really need you to, and to bring your friends.  We've asked all the clubs to put links to it on their websites, and CSV told us they'd link it too, but they didn't, which isn't helping, and I know I need to get out to DISC on Tuesdays and Thursdays more and promote it with flyers and so on.  We've got a great team running the races, event photographers taking good shots, commentary (where we actually know the rider's names!), food, drinks, music and well organised races.  We get results and photos up within 6 hours of the end of the races. We're not competing with any of the other clubs with this, it's a niche and one that no other club is filling, it's timed to avoid clashing with all the local crits and even with some other club's training, Brunswick at DISC, for example, I'm sure more of the Brunswick people would love the racing, and their training finishes at 10am ... plenty of time ... and anyway, this is once a month, not every week.

So, please, if you want to have a go at this, it's great fun and we treat our competitors with respect and want to make the series a success, but we can't do it without RIDERS!  Come and have a go.  If you're unsure, contact me and I'll make time to get you sorted on track bikes and get you doing some practice match sprints (free!) - you can't ask for more than that.

 

Hang in there big boy!

Posted by Dino Apolito at 2007-12-03 18:30
The ribs will get better but it takes time - lots of it. Mine are still giving me grief four months later. They don't really stop me doing anything but boy are they sore after some effort. Saturday night after the track racing and then Sunday night after the match sprints were particularly bad (Drugs please come back!) Would you consider some good long , brisk walks to help shed some kilos?

As the the Trek series. Don't get down about it. You have done everything humanly possibly and each round has been a huge success. The people who have turned up most certainly appreciate your efforts and those of us behind the scenes know just how much time and money you've put into this.

Build it and they will come - eventually.

Everyone is different

Posted by nick at 2007-12-04 21:01
Yeah when Bev came to visit me after my accident she couldn't believe I looked and felt so bad compared to Dino ( DINO YOU ARE BRAVER THAN ME) but Dino's ribs were physiologically worse than mine but yet to me who had just one fractured rib and one bruised I reacted much worse. Or perhaps my pain management wasn't as good and we all have different reactions to pain.
What I had to do is physically do no exercise for eight weeks. The Doctor told me not to resume riding until I felt no pain at all. Good or bad advice I enjoyed the rest but coming back is hard but my ribs are fully healed and I don't feel any pain whatsover but for gasping for breath because I am so unfit because of the time off the bike - Can't win either way!
What is it with ribs at the moment, someone fell at Glenvale at broke heaps of ribs.
Me - well I am at least resuming training, which is something.
Hope you get better soon

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