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Thats a scary amount of sand and gravel in that corner....

That's just on the shoulder, the road itself was clear. The sand/gravel is what caused the bike to lowside JUST before I hit the guardrail, causing me to try to go over the rail and the bike to catch my foot and try to pull it under. That's what destroyed my knee. And notice that if the guardrail wasn't there I'd have slid into some nice soft gravel...

3000th Post here. I am officially a triple post mean... lol
Not too bad though, considering my first post was back in August of 06.

I picked up a project GS850 the other day, but it's gonna get parted out. Engine turns over and everything so that's good, but the title swapping would be the difficult part. It's got two frames, an engine, and everything except for carbs and pipes, but to get it running would be in the neighborhood of $500-1000 and I don't have that kind of extra cash floating around right now.

I have two jobs right now, one part time bike mechanic and the other full time "security" out here on Peterson AFB. I am still hoping for an Alaska job for the summer, but it's looking very doubtful at this point. I guess that's about all the updates I need to put in here to track my progress throughout the years.

So I was reading back through and realized I didn't put in the whole story about what exactly I screwed up.
At first they just thought it was one broken hand bone (5th metacarpal) and a very stretched out knee ligament.
Boy were they wrong!
I broke the 4th and 5th metacarpals in my hand, I detached the MCL below the knee, I tore the ACL in half, tore the meniscus in the knee, and stretched my PCL pretty badly. I had surgeries for the MCL, ACL, and meniscus, but the PCL is ok. Something like 2% of NFL players don't even have theirs, and actually John Elway played his entire career without an ACL, he was born without one apparently.
Let's see, I was also wearing Mechanix gloves at the time of the crash, and the neoprene knuckle guard on it just ripped right through. I scraped the knuckle on my right pinkie down to the bone, so the pair of gloves I bought recently have the carbon fiber knuckle protectors on them to protect against that.

wow. I actually had no idea about your accident - I should have paid more attention! sorry R! Glad you are on the mend, glad you are doing better, and your pics are reinforcing ATGATT for me at a time when the pants are just harder to justify (heat, humidity, and feeling more confident [the worst thing of all - i know] )

Glad the work situation is good too! And thanks, as always, for your advice and wrenching hints!

-z

Glad you're wrenching at least part-time, Wrider! Lee Parks sells elk skin gloves for a very pretty penny--his point being that the hide is exceptionally sturdy, and that those gloves with hard covers do more harm than good. I wonder if other race-track people know of similar gloves, or of stories about which gloves work best and which are to be avoided.

Thanks guys! Yeah the elk leather ones are really nice, and hopefully this fall I'll be able to make my own hehehe. But I got the hard knuckle protector ones because I don't want to have the rub down into the bone again. Plus it's got a slippery surface so it won't grip the asphalt. I've tested them by hitting a few solid objects with them on, and they seem to protect pretty well, so I'm happy for now. The leathers parts on the one I have now are actually Kangaroo leather. It's very tough just like elk and alligator.

I have to be honest I don't usually wear pants, but I am definitely considering them now. I know how hard it is to get those Dickies rubbed through (In Phoenix I wore the same two pairs 5 days a week for a year and a half at school, plus bounced 2-3 nights a week in them, with no ill effects except the zippers broke), so I can only imagine shorts or regular jeans.

Wrider wrote:
I have to be honest I don't usually wear pants,

TMI!

Hey, how else do you think I get attention and avoid being run over???

So I got a job today at Jackel Motorsports. I start on Tuesday the 22nd. I'm super excited, because it's a shop that I've actually heard of and has a great reputation. Plus it's a performance shop instead of just "I want new paint." So I'll actually be working on bikes instead of their plastics. Now I just need to make sure I don't get eaten or attacked by the shop gator...