The Road wasn't that Long (Just About)!

velo.2010

Yeah, Still alive and pretty much healed after my accident in early June which resulted in a badly broken leg though I almost messed it up with an almighty misjudgement of just how ready I was to return (more of that later). I'm fine now and so maybe I can tell you how I made it.

A recap of the injury first. It was a spiral fracture of the right femur. The break extended down and across the femur which resulted in a nice long Titanium pin down the shaft of the bone with a second pin going through the top of the femur and into my hip socket for extra support. I didn't know too much about that second pin until I saw it on screen at the second consultation. My reaction was 'Christ, Feach ar Seo!' (yes I watched the Tour on TG4). The long pin is held fixed by two screws placed near the bottom of the bone. All in all a lot of metal though maybe not enough Ti for a touring frame just yet!:D It was a short stay in hospital as it turned out. Four days and I was home. When I wrote about the accident on here I wasn't long home and pumped full of painkillers. At that point it did feel as if everything was lost, I couldn't see a future and I moaned on about life blahh....blahh....etc. You appreciate though at that time I was in bits, mentally and not just physically. However the mind is strong and thoughts soon turned towards making a full recovery. I took some solice in what the consultant said to me after the operation and that I would be back to some normality after three months!

At this point I should mention the suppport I recieved from my family. As a single person (no surprise to some perhaps) I relied on my family and my mother in particular for those first few weeks. Her duty to me ended many moons ago, now here she is having to support a grown man. I could do the basics but when it came to meals, getting up the stairs, washing my feet, I was helpless. This lasted about three weeks during which time I was a pain at times and probably deserved a slap or two! At this point I was climbing the walls so to speak. I just wanted to get out and about but my physical condition was poor and I could do little. The physio had given me a set of generic physical exercises to do when I got home. These included typical leg raising movements such as lifting the leg from the hip and working on bending the knee and lifting the leg at the same time. I must admit that I found it hard at times to do these exercises and certaintly struggled initially to keep up with the set amount required to help increase overall movement in the leg. Apparently it takes four times the amount of energy to do simple tasks for someone with severe impediment compared to those who are normally physically capable! I could feel it!:(

My first consultation was two and half weeks after the day of the accident. The staples came out while there was nothing of note regarding my injury as it was so close after the event. I didn't see the x-rays but they showed the leg was stable. Little was said other than keep up the routine of daily home physio and there should be improvement next time I would be seen. After the consultation I made a concerted effort to try and increase my range of motion in the leg and begin to get about a bit more. There were long periods on my own and there was nothing else to do other than try to improve my physical condition. So I started out with some light upper body workouts as well as the regular physio. Soon, I mean literally as soon as I was lifting any sort of weight I had my eye on the turbo trainer! I wondered how quickley I could get back on it. I knew instinctively that it would help, in particular giving me that range of motion in the knee. The knee hurt like hell for weeks, the ligaments do the work as your muscles waste away from lack of use. My right leg was a mess, the muscle had gone and my hip was more exposed while my ass had disappeared. That pissed me off and made me more determined to get on the turbo and try to build myself up. So, on that Sunday, three weeks to the day, I dragged my body over the turbo and clipped my feet in. Finally, after much faltering and questioning what exactly I was doing, I turned the pedals, very slowly! You can imagine my elation, I could now see a future so to speak, a future which included cycling!:)

So the plan was set. I could now use the turbo to build up the cardio while I would continue to lift weights, all the while continuing the physio exercises laid out for me early on. The turbo was tough going as you might imagine. The pain in the knee took some time to subside, though I found being on the turbo helped with pain relief. The muscles were slow to rebuild in the leg as I expected giving what the consultant said. Pain and muscle loss aside, I was quickly increasing the power I could put out while on the turbo though I was hitting the wall early on in workouts and getting that horrible feeling in the chest like when you really push it on the bike for the first time. Another aspect of my recovery was the inclusion of more specific core work. This was something I hadn't really focused on for some time as I was cycling quite a bit and using that as my 'core' work. The core exercises were terrific for building strenght again around the hips which in turn helped the legs gain support. Soon I found the muscles in my right leg responding to the turbo and the leg exercises, plus my 'juicy doubles' started to come back!:D

At this point I must address a point relevant to my recovery and possibly a factor in how I broke my leg. That is my weight. I am naturally a light fecker and never really fixated on my weight. I was what I now consider a healthier size years back when I did other sports and some weight training. When I started more serious cycling two years ago, my weight would have decreased given the endurance aspect of the sport. Last year I was weighed for a test and was shocked at how light I was. So I tried to put on more when at the same time the idea of doing the Marmotte came on the scene. That meant more cycling as well as more eating so there was very little change in my weight. There were many factors involved in my crash and perhaps the light weight exposed me more to breaking a bone, I'm not sure. My weight now is good and I intend keeping it that way even if that means less cycling in the future. Any slight loss in endurance is more than compensated by the increased power I feel I have gained.

Anyway, time for the next consultation. Six weeks and a couple of days after the crash. This time there was progress and boy was there progress. I had the sort of healing usually seen after 3 months. I was walking pretty much unaided at that stage as each and every day saw remarkable improvement in how I could walk and do things I couldn't do a couple of days before. Even if the consultant had not given me such a thumbs up, with the rate of recovery I was experiencing, I was determined to get out on the bike as soon as possible. So I did, 6 weeks and 6 days after the crash I got out for 40 KMs. The first few KMs were a re-introduction to actually just staying upright on a bike but soon it all came back to me. More spins followed over the next week. All the while I was considering making a proper comeback of sorts - the Orwell Sportive. Big mistake!!

Why I did it I don't know. Bravado, desperation, just a genuine desire to get back to normal cycling and the fact I had missed so much through the Summer. The omens weren't good on the day itself. I was late! After a quick lift I hooked up with some Lucan guys similarly late themselves. Felt fine, in fact tremendously well as we went up to Glencree passing many on the road and within reach of the lead bunch. I had heard of some newly laiden gravel around the top of the descent to Powerscourt. Fine I thought, if it seems too much I can always bug out. I should have as soon as we reached that point. But no, I had to go on. ****, as soon as we pointed down I knew this was bad. I wouldn't have been that great going down If I was healthy but I wasn't healthy. Sure, I was healing quickly but I wasn't fully healed for ****s sake not after 9 weeks. It took me going down that descent to realise that. I wanted it to stop and stop now. I didn't have great flexibility on my right side and freezing up with fear didn't help. Someone mentioned elsewhere that I missed the bend, brother I wasn't trying to make any bend this experience just had to stop. I dare not try to brake too hard on the gravel so as not to come down on my right side. The decision was made to aim for the side of the road while braking slowly. If I fell off then I would do so on my left side thus protecting my right leg. I didn't expect a 3 foot drop in to a ditch. Anyway enough said. I was sore and pissed off and just wanted to go home. Thanks to the guys for helping me out.:o

So the Summer is nearly over and its still less than 3 months since my crash. Remember the consultant said it would take 3 months to get back to normality and I was out weeks before, pushing it too far, trying to get back and I almost paid a heavy price for it. Better to rest up fully and think about next year. No goals as such, maybe the Marmotte. Who knows. Anyway, I had my fill of daytime TV - Golden Girls and Jeremy Kyle, I don't know which was funnier.:rolleyes:Oh and Karpets did push Contador off his bike!

Bye for now! hope that account didn't bore you.:)

manafana

get better mate i was kind of other side of things, didnt push myself hard enough get back, and ended up longer recovery time i found i improved alot but that last 10-20% to get back to full abilty was a hard slog. I seem be lucky in that iv heard of accidents at simliar speeds as mine and where people also landed on top of head, i did my elbow others where far worse. It affected my descents for while but im relaxed again and going a good speed without going mad on way down

cdaly_

Good on ya for your determination. Keep it up...

CianRyan

That was some good reading, man.
Glad you're on a good road to recovery.

buffalo

Good to hear you're well on the way on recovery - missed you at the races!

vistafinder

F---ing hell! That sounds like tough going. Well done. Like they say in Munster. To the brave and the faithfull nothing is impossible.

fat bloke

F**kin hell indeed. I had my mouth agape towards the end there, I thought you were going to say you damaged your leg again on that descent to Powerscourt!

What did you do from there? Did you remount and just head home or get a lift or what???

velo.2010

I got a lift Fat Bloke, thank goodness. I forget the chaps name but thankyou to him. I couldn't have cycled home at that time.

studiorat

Was meant to get out on the bike after work tonight, too lazy, too cold, you've put me to shame.

You sir, are a LEGEND! Real Hoogerland stuff, awesome.

velo.2010

studiorat wrote: »

Real Hoogerland stuff.

Now that was incredible how he and Flecha even got going again. Proper hardmen. You can imagine that I was wincing throughout the replays of all those crashes and in particular that one of Vino. Nasty!

DirkVoodoo

Forget Lance Armstrong, this should be made into a movie. Have a title and all:

"My right femur: The velo2010 story"

Glad, you are back.

velo.2010

DirkVoodoo wrote: »

"My right femur: The velo2010 story"

Starring DirkVooDoo as Velo.2010!

Would you be interested, not much in the way of love scenes though!:D

DirkVoodoo

velo.2010 wrote: »

Would you be interested, not much in the way of love scenes though!:D

I dunno, I've a pretty good right hand

velo.2010

DirkVoodoo wrote: »

I dunno, I've a pretty good right hand

Oh dear!

Dermot Illogical

velo.2010 wrote: »

Oh dear!

You're left-handed?

seve65

fantastic, well done.

velo.2010

Enough already, my mother might be reading this!:o

joker77

Great read again, good to hear there was no damage done on the Randonee crash, you f*cking mentaller

velo.2010

10 months on from the day of my crash and I thought I'd dig up this old thread rather than create a new one. I had, what I thought, would be my final consultation this morning. Not the case! I'm due back in August when it'll be decided if I need another operation to remove one or both pins.........oh bollox!:(

While the bone has healed exceptionally well (and new bonegrowth continues to occur up to one year after the date of fracture) I haven't been totally happy with the sensations near the hip area where they went in. For complicated and too boring to post here reasons, when they put the pins in they never sit quite flush to the bone so some tissue may be exposed to friction and thus some discomfort. I'm not too bad and it feels a bit better all the time but it has obviously affected my confidence on the bike.

I'm not looking for miracles and accept the bone will be 80%+ of what it was. The consultant said that it (the healed area) shouldn't overtly affect how I go about things......anyone of us could accidentally walk in front of a bus etc etc. The suggestion maybe is just give it the full year and a bit before I completely let loose, if I feel confident, on the bike. It just that feeling I have in the leg that reminds me and I think 'oh ****, this happened to me'.

It was a mistake taking out an open licence this year. The club league may have to go on hold though I could still use it as training. The idea is to work on building more leg strength before August and see if the sensations subside some more to the extent I feel an operation might be more harm than good! Who knows, I'll have that chat with them in August.

Its a real pisser! To be a relatively new to this game cyclist and have to be dealing with the aftermath of an injury like this - I feel like I deserve a Pro contract!:D Anyway, I have the aerobars and I plan to get out and focus on that for a while to try to build up the legs some more. I'm doing a good impression of Armstrong's position circa comeback time Nov 2008 - pretty average but I'd be happy if I had that power!:pac:

Thanks for reading and please no sympathy posts (I don't deserve any), just letting ye know how it is. And I promise I'll get a copy of the before/after x-ray at some stage, I keep forgetting to snap an image while I'm in there. It's mad looking.:)

Lumen

All this talk of crashing, aerobars and Lance. Are you going to become a triathlete?

It's OK, there's no shame.

velo.2010

Lumen wrote: »

All this talk of crashing, aerobars and Lance. Are you going to become a triathlete?

It's OK, there's no shame.

:pac:. Maybe!

seeing_ie

One thing that came to mind reading your account* is, like most cyclists, you likely neglect the rest of your body to focus on your cycling or
cycling-specific training.
Might be worth your while speaking to an expert and working in some speed, agility, co-ordination and strength drills into your routine.
I can imagine, for example, how squats (as part of a balanced routine) might be beneficial to your health and bone density, while not offering an immediate improvement maybe to your cycling performance

The fitness forum would be a good place to get advice.

*note: I am no expert in this field.

Hi Velo, pardon me for asking, but how did the (leg breaking) crash happen? Was rooting about in your posting history there but couldn't find it. I'm very nosey!:D

kennyb3

Hopefully you ll come right. I feel your pain and know your frustration - its nearly 8 months now since i split my hamstring tendon at the back of my knee. You've done incredibly well to get where you are now.