It was the best of times, it was the worst timing

I think I failed to mention in my update post that Aaron is now a bicycle mechanic at a local shop. As a result, he is able to keep his finger on the pulse of what bikes are available. Luckily, he picked out an awesome Giant bike for me and we've been riding a lot lately. I told him I wanted to try trail riding and so we've been doing a lot of that lately too.

Yesterday we went on a (wait for it) 15 mile trail ride at a Lake 45 minutes from our house with some of the same friends we did the Dirty Dash race with.  It was hard for some of us (ME), especially since there were a lot of hills.

Just the same, it was also a lot of fun....until the very last stretch. I'm no sure what happened. I could have been going too fast and one of our friends said I had been standing pedaling, sat down and let go of my left handlebar. At that moment, though, I hit some loose sand and gravel and ate it...in front of everyone. The result? This guy:

The worst part is that I had survived the entire ride and I only had possibly 1/10 of a mile to go on the flattest part of the trail and I ate it.  I think my pride was hurt a bit too.  But today, my leg hurts a lot worse than my pride and looks worse to me too, but what do I know? I'm kind of a drama queen when it comes to my own injuries and this is pretty dramatic/traumatic. So I took the day off and have been resting up. I've read it can take up to two weeks for the pain to stop and I can't wait.