%**Crash Son**% Laurel Classic Mountain Bike Challenge mtb

Saturday venture up to the Laurel Classic outside of Wellsboro in the Tioga State Forest, the skids were going to race - not I, because of being sick several days with large volumes of water leaving my body. Registration went smoothly, spoke with Eric who I just saw and raced the SM100 & W101. He wants to be a W101 volunteer!! Evidently the SM100 is the race that rocks from several PA residents. >
Chad rolls in at 9:45am along with his VisitPA friends Ray & Nancy, nothing like cutting it close 10am start ZTR is ready to rip he is feeling good.The skids are ready to roll out.

I head up Darling Rd Trail so I can see the riders come down & take pics.
I am anxious on the verdict of the race to see if Dagny & I can have a pacto to stick like bandaids & do it '07, of course cautiously. I see quite a few middle age people doing this so I think we can. I am getting worried early on hoping nothing happened because I saw several juniors go by and I was hoping ZTR would be in the top 3. I was worring at 11:52 (1hr 52min)Kelsi or ZTR has not gone through and I am ready with the camera. I figured if one goes down the other would stay or help the other out - I repeated this several times to myself and two other people. I headed back down to base and wait 15 min and Kelsi is coming down the road all ALONE! No Zachary! She winds through finish and says, "Didn't you hear about Zachary?" Oh crap! She said, "they had to get the ATV six wheeler to get him out of the woods and the Morris ambulance took him to the hospital". Poop! Before I knew it, someone said, we have been paging you and then a DCNR officer came up to me and said he will be ok, he has a broken collarbone & perhaps a rib or two. Officer Caldwell gathered information & his bike was here and the helmet & hydropak were still up on the mountain, which was no problem. Later Caldwell brought his stuff to the emergency room. I could pee now. I guess we can't hang out with Chad & VisitPa...
so Kelsi & I gathered items and went to Wellsboro Soldiers & Sailors Memorial Hospital. I called Al and he was wondering if we would still get hoagies from Moose Bros in Montoursville. Heck yes, the hoagies Rule! The hospital gathers info and they take me bake to the xray area because he is having a CAT scan to check his spleen and needed to verify his allergy to shellfish (can't inject the dye). He has a cervical collar on and he says that the morphine is working really fast & his whole body is numb. I never spoke to the ER Dr because they were busy...Don't get me started they only skim the surface. Verified broken collar bone and no ribs broke, despite sticking out, just bruised & spine trauma - won't trust until I take him to SunOrtho. One thing I can't believe is that they never took off his jersey or other article of clothing. It was still zipped up to his neck. He had scraps all over his back and his scalp has bloody cuts all over & bruises but never checked or look on his head or back. Hmmmm.
ZTR recant, He was heading down the grassy pipeline at 25mph & doing really well in the race - top 5 when he hit a dip that went down and up abruptly which casue him to flip over the bars. He landed on the top of his head first which caused his face to hit his collarbone and slam on the ground about 5 ft from his bike. He said he could not move his whole body for 15 min, probably from hitting his cervical spine area. Two riders stopped and moved him off the racers path. Kelsi approached in 30 minutes & saw him laying there. She went to get the DCNR officer & stayed until help came! She was offered a ride back but opted to finish the race. What a sister!.
This AM ZTR wants to do the race nxt yr- "beautiful wonderful trails". We will go up there again between now & then & try a leisure ride..
Results: http://www.twistedspokes.org/2006MTBResults.htm