OK......to friends and family and chekkies in New Zealand,I need to find Miss Suzi. I know she was teaching level three in the States some time back BUT she needs to be here, with me in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia!!! It's all about me honey!!! Suzi .. I need your expertise in moving bones...I am injured!!! I need your miracle hands and I was wondering if you could pop over to do a spot of treatment. How about it? We can get you and the boy a room at the Sheraton Addis, combine it with an little altitude training, there's a nice bar by the pool for you both to hang out at, nice shops, restaurants...cute shoes..etc etc. Need a break from NZ..come to Ethiopia!! It would be such fun..you don't need to ride...............
Seriously, my race is all but over. I found out yesterday that my sprained wrist is more than sprained! My injury and fall in Dongolar, Sudan 3 weeks ago wasn't a sprain but a hair line fracture of the distal end of the ulna and a massive separation of all the bones in the wrist and after an Xray and consulation with a orthopod bone specialist, who just happened to be in Addis this week..I get to have a plaster cast put on this afternoon!! The descent down the Blue Nile Gorge re-injured, aggravated my wrist and so with the 1300m drop in height and 18km of shitty, rough, off road, rocky, pothole, gravel..get the picture..nasty roads my hand was numb and full of pins and needles and I could not hold on to the handle bars of my bike.
I tried to ride for about 20 minutes in the uphill time trial, but it just got worse. I had to get on the bucky..one of the support trucks and so got an automatic 12 hour penalty added to my time. I tried to ride the next day but couldn't and so my race is all but over. To answer all the emails asking why I wasn't winning all the stages here's why. Of the last 11 stages of the section from Khartoum to Addis Ababa I raced five days and won the stages on those days but I did not race six days,I was sitting on my butt with not a happy face, in the truck--three days due to vomitting and stomach issues and three due to my wrist, so consequently the section win went to Eva..stage wins being 6 to Eva, 5 to me. From now on I will only be riding the tarmac days and on the off road days in Northern Kenya I will be in the truck..which means I will get 12 hour penalties for all of those days BUT my wrist will heal and in the words on the orthpod 'you will not have permanent damage and it will not become chronic'. I have to have my wrist in a plaster cast for three weeks so sorry to the fan club for not being able to stick it to the metal!!!
On the other hand Chris the dish had a superb uphill time trial!!! The bonus of being in the support truck was watching Chris just nail the hill. 23km of up hill 1300m climb off road. You should have seen that billy goat go. He clearly won it in 1 hour and 39 minutes which is an amazing time...(although Chris being Chris wanted to do it in 1 hour and 30 minutes) and he was two minutes ahead of the second person which was Gunther. His legs were on fire on that day and it was great to watch.
Chris checked us into the swanky Sheraton Addis last night and so the bummer of having to get my wrist in plaster was buffered by the fabulous room, the big bath with hot, hot water and the large glass of South African Pinotage that I consumed to drown my sorrows!! I have to go and get this damn plaster..I'll get back to you later.Trust you are all well. Ethiopia is an amazing country and we will defintely be coming back to visit ti again.
Love ya.
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2 comments:
Hello Chris and Janet,
Good luck with riding to and in Kenia, Janet, hope your wrist heals quick ! Greetings from Joke
Hi to you both... I read the updates daily.. and Janet I was as upset as you!!! "BUGGER"as they would say here in NZ.. Keep it up and may the wrist heal quickly..
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