Friday, March 24, 2006

The Curse of Wakefield Strikes Again!!!

I'm particularly fond of Grumpy J's theory of The Curse of Wakefield. Basically Jason is convinced that the rock around Wakefield contains some kind of kryptonite. People who don't normally crash or get injured have the strangest wrecks at Wakefield. They can pound the rocks at Gambrill or EF with no problem, but put them on the XC trails at Wakefield and something happens. Maybe they're pushing to go faster than they should. Maybe they're just letting their guard down because they can... It is, after all, only Wakefield.

My similarities to Superman can be counted on one hand with three fingers left over. I love being seen in public wearing tights and a cape (that's another story) and I am succeptable to kryptonite.

I was chasing Larry and Punga around Phase 2 in the reverse direction last night. We'd just come down the two switchbacks at the very north end of the park. I looked away long enough to launch a snot rocket. When I turned back, I had a split second to see a golf ball in the middle of the trail. I'd love to say that I had plenty of time to say to myself, "Self. What is a golf ball doing in the middle of the trail?". No such luck. My brain doesn't work that fast. I just hit the thing with the middle of the front tire. The front wheel jumped to the right about 4" and that was just enough so that my attempt to recover ran me into the bench cut and I pile drived into the side of the hill.

No damage done. My personal habbit of just laying there for a moment and letting my body relax after a crash probably scared Scott a little bit. I purposefully don't move around much in an attempt to just let the incident pass and that must have looked strange. When I opened my eyes, I noticed that the golf ball had come to rest about 6" from my face.

I eventually got up, dusted off, straightened the saddle on my bike and rode on. That was by far the most tame of my run-ins with the Curse of Wakefield. Hopefully it will be my last for the season.

Happy Trails.

Pete

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