Monthly Archives: July 2010

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I <3 Jens Voigt

The guy is simply amazing.

He crashed during a descent on stage 16 doing about 70kms and simply brushed it off. The team car was miles ahead so he flagged down an official race car, hopped on a teeny weeny juniors’ bike with toe clips and barrelled down the rest of the descent so he could catch up with the team car and get one of his spare bikes. Then at the finish he gives this funny interview about what happened.

Like I said – simply amazing.

When I stacked and busted my ribs, all I did was complain and whine for weeks. Jens? He just dismisses it. One of the last hard men of cycling. Check out cycling tips blog for the story of Jens’ crash in his own words and see a photo of Jens on a bike that’s way, way, waaaaaaaaaaaaaaay too small for him. I think Wade needs to make a t-shirt that says “What would Jens do?”

A commonly made comment: Jens doesn’t get road rash, the road gets Jens rash.

Hoorah!

I have a place to live! And it’s even the one I really wanted.

It’s not huge or anything but it looks like it’s been renovated in the last five years, meaning it still looks really nice. It’s all neutral colours so my art will look good on the walls. I don’t have space for a washing machine which will be annoying as it means I’ll be doing a lot of hand-washing of my cycling gear. Gonna need a bigger bucket. I even have my own tiny backyard in which I might have a go at growing some herbs. There’s a car port which means my car won’t be at the mercy of the elements. I’ll probably have to lose some furniture but realistically how much do I need? The big issue will be making sure there’s room for my bikes.

And why did I really want this place? It’s just around the corner from the Chandler Hwy entrance to Yarra Boulevard. If I really want to, I can ride hills every day (but I don’t think so).

And why am I up so late during on a school night? Tour de France, stage three. They’ve just hit one of the long sections of cobble that they use in the Paris-Roubaix ride. Frank Schleck is down and it looks like his tour might be over. The start of the tour this year has been absolutely brutal. Crashes are part of the race but not like this. One Australian is already out and I’ve got my fingers crossed that the rest make it through the tour. I think this year just finishing would be a good result.

Wow… Lance Armstrong looks like he’s really suffering over the cobbles. Never thought I’d see that. Cadel is tucked up in a group that’s chasing down the leaders so who knows where he’ll end up. Love to see him win a stage. Love, love, love to see him in the yellow jersey.

So, what’s doing?

Umm… well, right now I’m off the bike. I’ve got a bung knee so the physio I’m seeing has asked I do no long rides this weekend. I’m allowed to commute to work but I have to tape my knee.

My knees started hurting about a week after my bike fit. My seat was put down and it turned out to be too low. I didn’t exactly rush to put it back up which was a bit stupid. The right knee has sorted itself out but the left is giving me grief. One trip to the physio later and it tuns out my patella has been scraping the tendons underneath it and the muscle on the outside is pulling it off-centre with every turn of the crank. The inside muscle isn’t doing its job of creating equal tension so my patella doesn’t move from side to side.

Kate – the physio – said she doesn’t think it’s too bad (she said she’d seen a lot worse) but it does need correcting. So now I have to flex my quaddie 100 times whilst tapping the inner muscle. Weird huh? Apparently the tapping sends a message to my brain to grow the muscle. I also have to tape my knee if I’m going to get on my bike. I’ve been cleared to continue riding to work but I’m not allowed to do any long rides at all. *pouts* She also thinks I may have a Baker’s cyst. These aren’t dangerous at all as it’s just a pouch of fluid that’s formed at the back of my knee. There’s not a lot I can do about it anyway except rest it and take some ibuprofen to get the inflammation down. I’m sure all will be revealed and hopefully resolved with treatment.

I have a sneaking suspicion that both my patellas get pulled to the outside of my knees but it’s never hurt before so perhaps it’s being pulled a little further than normal.

I chose a sports physio this time as I figured my knee is a sport-related injury. Knees are tricky too so I thought it’d be better to see someone who was more likely to be familiar with their problems. But lordy, did she hurt me or what? She did a thing called a muscle strip from my hip to my knee and I nearly cried. Basically, it’s her running her fingers down my leg as hard as she can right over over the bone to break up the muscle fibres. This forces the muscle to relax but holy crap, It was painful!! I’m also sporting a rather lovely bruise at the moment where she did the most work. Haven’t decided if it helped or not as it still hurts. I’m supposed to roll a tennis ball down my leg as hard as I can but I decided I’m going to wait until the bruising heals.

The scary thing is that she said she wasn’t even doing it that hard. The pros would get it done infinitely harder than what she did to me. I also think I detected a note a slight note of satisfaction in her voice when she said that. Perhaps I should be worried…

As for the house hunting, well lets not talk about that. Every time I think about it, I end up with this slight feeling of PANIC!! Looked a place today that was okay and am about to go see another. This one I think I really want so I’ve already filled in the application form. Hopefully that will put me at the top of the pile.