After nineteen days they finally came out. The gash still isn’t completely sealed as it’s still draining a bit. It’s not infected, just a tough one to heal. Riding a bike wasn’t an option until the stitches came out. If my knee were to approach a 90 degree bend I’d feel an incredible amount of tension from the stitches and it just wouldn’t go further. So I rode the trainer for the first time last night after the stitches came, or I tried. This morning went a little better and I managed about ten minutes of pedaling. It felt so good to pedal again. My knee is mostly just stiff from scar tissue and not experiencing full range of motion for awhile. I hope after a few days of light pedaling on the trainer and working on increasing my range of motion I’ll notice my knee just a little less. I still hope to race the Collegiate National XC Championships toward the end of October.

This weekend I’m acting as ‘team support’ at the Horny Toad Hustle in Las Cruces, New Mexico. The race is our collegiate conference championships so a few riders from the team are competing. We’re camping at the venue so it should be a good time. Hopefully I’ll post some pictures later this weekend.

I may have mentioned that I’d be forced to take a break from blogging for a little while. But now I have all this extra time on my hands since I still CAN’T RIDE A BIKE. There was a chance that my stitches were on their way out this morning but that didn’t fly since some of my knee is still oozing. So I’ve got another appointment to go back in next Friday. It’s already been 12 days since I last pedaled a bike and I can’t run (but I had problems with that before the stitches) so I’ll be taking some long walks this weekend so I don’t go crazy.

I hope you all have a great weekend!

Chloe

I took this picture because it’s not often I see lizards sunbathe on cactus. I even felt a little pleased that someone took a liking to my cactus, after all it’s amazing it’s not dead. Two days after moving in to my new place, I arrived home after classes to find my cactus laying on the doorstep without it’s pot. Hayduke uprooted my cactus, spilled gravel all over the porch and then I’m not sure what he did with the pot. Later I found it around the side of the house.

Anyway, the picture didn’t seem so cute once I downloaded it and took a closer look. I think the lizard is dead. I might have to go outside and take another look. Now how do I get the lizard off the cactus?

I’ll just post a few notes to sum up the NMBS series finals in Brian Head, UT.

-The 11 hour drive on Friday was only supposed to take 9. Once up in the Cedar Breaks area I drove toward Panguitch instead of Parawaun, losing an hour. It wasn’t until the next day I realized I lost the second hour due to the time change.

-I halfway threw up some espresso during the short track and got pulled about ten minutes in.

-On the first real descent of the cross-country loop I made a small mistake and wound up crashing my knee into a jagged stick. Joy Duerksen stopped and helped me out until we found a local with an ATV to drive me back to Brian Head. I finished up the weekend with 24 stitches in my knee.

-My parents made the trip from Boulder for the weekend to watch the races. I’m not sure what I would have done had they not been around. Mom postponed a lot of work to drive me back to Tucson and help me out for a few days.

Since last weekend:

My knee is healing up well. No signs of infection and after some x-rays it’s confirmed that the damage is just superficial. The best part of the week was cruising around in a disability cart. At any building on campus I can call cart service and a golf cart will pick me up and drive me to another location on campus. I skipped classes on Tuesday but since then I’ve managed to keep doing the things I do (minus the pedaling part).

That’s about it for now. Sorry, I’m not going to post any pictures of my knee. I just about throw up every time I have to clean it and I don’t want it on my blog. Thanks for your help Mom!

Chloe