Whistler and Vancouver, glad to be back

My back is feeling great right now. This past weekend Cheryl and I went to Whistler to meet up with the DirtCorps. I rode all day, and well into Extended Play.

The weather was on and off. It rained, then it was hot and sunny, then it rained, then sunny etc...

There were a few casualties this weekend. Dan's son Sam broke his wrist on a slippery section of the trail, and I witnessed a couple of potentially serious wipeouts, but thankfully there was no other carnage of note.

Sunday Cheryl and I had a brunch with Andrea/Jerry, and dinner with her co-worker Sean before I headed back to Seattle.

The big news of course is that Cheryl is moving to Seattle! Years of back and forth across the border each weekend has been painful. She now has a new job at Casey Family Programs, and we're both very excited about that.

I think we'll still spend a lot of time in Vancouver/Whistler, but at least we'll be able to carpool :)

Crankworx is just around the corner

It's almost that time of year: Crankworx.

I went to the 2004, 2005, and 2006 Crankworx festivals, and I'm planning on going to Crankworx 2007 as well. This year it goes from July 21-29, and the event to watch is obviously the SlopeStyle competition - so I'll be there the second weekend.

Crankworx is the most anticipated freeride mountain bike festival in the northwest for sure, and possibly on this continent (not sure if red bull rampage is a contender or not.) Thousands of bikers getting together to watch the progression of freeride biking which seems to be growing exponentially every year. Not good for lift lines, but good for the sport.

Every year Whistler builds taller, skinnier, weirder, and more challenging stunts, and I'm hoping this year will be no exception. We shall see what the Whistler trail builders have in store for us this time around.

It will be good.

No back? No problem - I have Guitar Hero II

It's been almost 3 weeks since I messed up my back at Whistler. I'm feeling a lot better right now, but I'm still not ready to go out and ride anywhere interesting. To help me through this hard time I decided to buy Guitar Hero II for XBox 360. It's as fun as I thought it would be - what a great game.

So far I've managed to beat every song on the "easy", "medium", and "hard" difficulty levels. I've started the "expert" level, but that one will take a bit more time - it's pretty technical.

When playing the songs on "hard" or "expert" you start to feel as though you're actually playing the song - which is a bit strange given you're really just holding a plastic guitar with 5 fret buttons and a pick emulator. I swear that Nirvana's "Heart Shaped Box" is easier to play on a real guitar than on "Expert" in the game - I'm not sure how they pulled that off.

As far as the song list goes... I was pleasantly surprised. They seemed to have everything from Elvis to Megadeth. My favorite songs on the list include "Search and Destroy", "Sweet Child of Mine", "Monkey Wrench", and "Tonight I'm Gonna Rock You Tonight". Most sorely missing from the set list were songs from AC/DC, and Metallica. Another notable song is the "Trogdor" theme which you can unlock in the store.

I have already built up a few feature requests for the Guitar Hero folks, a couple of small tweaks could make this game rock twice as hard as it already rocks.

Anyhow, I'm currently sitting in Vancouver after getting my bike back from the Marzocchi shop. As part of my suspension overhaul I had them put in a set of stiffer springs in my front fork to make it much harder to bottom out. If I had done that sooner I might not have messed up my back. I had two medium springs in there to start with, now those have been replaced with two heavy springs. The bike is feeling a lot stiffer, and it will take a much bigger hit to bottom out the suspension now.

This comes at a time where Whistler is upping the ante in the bike park. They just opened a new drop at the base of the hill which is looking pretty big. I'll be working my way up to it this summer, but I'm not making any promises :)

Whistler->Cypress->Whistler->Emergency Room

I had an amazing weekend two weeks ago. Cheryl and I went up to Whistler Saturday, then Glade and I rode Cypress Sunday, and on Monday I went back to Whistler with Glade. Monday didn't end that well though.

It was my first big riding weekend of the year, and I had a few solid falls on Cypress, so I was a bit tired going into Monday's Whistler ride. Glade and I rode A-Line a few times pretty hard and then decided to take a more technical ride down Schleyer, and Clown Shoes. Before that last run my back was really feeling weak. I stopped at the top, took off my pack and stretched it out a bit. I should have taken that as a sign to take a rest, but I continued.

We ripped through Schleyer, and started to bomb down Clown Shoes. On one of the structures I lost balance so I decided to pop off it to the left to avoid falling too far. I only dropped 6 feet or so, and I landed solidly on my pedals, but it was a flat landing, the impact was enough to bottom out my suspension, and my back took too much of the impact and gave out.

Sharp pain always sucks, but it really sucks when it's your back. I couldn't really move much, but I was able to squirm off the trail. I couldn't sit up or roll over for about an hour. Glade eventually helped me up onto my bike, and I was able to lean over my bike fork using it as a crutch to get me off the trail and to the bottom of the hill.

In retrospect I should have went directly to Whistler First Aid, but at the bottom of the hill I was feeling a bit better, so I figured I could just go home and rest. After sitting in the truck on the way home my back seized up and when I got back to Vancouver I couldn't get out of the truck - which wasn't a good scene. After a lot of effort I was able to make it into bed, but then my back seized up even more.

To make a long story somewhat shorter I eventually needed to take an ambulance to the emergency room. 3 hours in emerg was not the best way to spend my Monday night, but the painkillers they gave me helped out a ton. A muscle relaxant injection almost immediately took hold, and after x-rays showed no breaks I was out of there and back in bed.

I couldn't drive home the next day, so I took a sick day to recover. The doctor thinks this is just a muscular issue, so I should be good to go very soon. I've been taking it easy ever since, and I was getting a lot better until yesterday when I threw it out again while packing my office.

I'll be going to physical therapy to make sure I get the speediest recovery possible. I hope to be back in action relatively soon.