The 2nd Annual Leesburg Bakers Dozen

Saturday marked the 2nd Annual Leesburg Bakers Dozen sponsored by Plum Grove Cyclery. Lee rode in this 13 hour mountain bike relay race last year with Amy and Tom Marquis. This year his team was made up with Dharma Dill, Marc Genberg and Lee. What an exciting day. The weather definitely held up for the racers. It was the most beautiful day!! The sun was shining, the beer was flowing and the cows were mooing! Oh, and the bulls were kept away by electric fences. BIG bulls. But I digress......The race kicked off at 11:00 AM with about 100 plus racers starting their first lap. Dharma took one for the team and headed out first with Marc following her in second and Lee in third. Dharma had an excellent first lap then Marc went out for two in a row.

Just to explain my role in this whole thing.....I'm one of the team "moms". I am there to get what anybody needs before, during, or after their lap. Water, sandwiches, cookies, beer, you name it, I get it! Although, I definitely wasn't expecting a trip to the emergency room on Saturday. Yep! Nick, who has become a really close friend to Lee and me, was out on the course, came through between his first and second laps to get a fresh water bottle from me, then went out on his second lap. Lee left for his first two shortly there after. When Nick came in from his second lap, everybody noticed he had blood all over his face and he was riding his bike very unsteadily. When he didn't really respond to anybody, we knew something was VERY wrong. He came in, sat down, and just looked completely dazed. We grabbed an EMT who happened to be right across the way, and he told us we needed to get him to the ER immediately, or as I like to say, STAT. Without hesitation, I volunteered to take him. Meanwhile, Amy Casey, a racer and wife of one of the main Pedal Shop racers, Jim, called Erin, Nick's wife to let her know what was going on. I exchanged numbers with Erin, got Nick's insurance information, and I ran (yes, I actually ran) to get the truck and came back to pick up Nick. The EMT told us to go to Cornwall, which is the stand alone ER at the old Loudoun hospital center. We were on our way and Nick was talking up a storm the whole way. This was a good thing, except he kept repeating himself over and over. That is not a good thing. Something was definitely not right. I just kept talking to him and didn't let him know that I was scared out of my mind, to the point I was actually crying. To make things worse, Leesburg was hosting some flower festival on Saturday so all of downtown was blocked off. I had to figure out where the hospital was through all the detours. I finally found it and got Nick inside. Surprisingly, they took him right in and I was able to stay with him, which was good because I had to let them know that he had been totally repeating himself the whole drive there. He seemed completely fine (other than the HUGE fat lip and scrapes all over his face). He knew all the important things he needed to know, i.e. birthday, SSN, wife's name and numbers, insurance info, everything. And in true Nick fashion, was making jokes about things. They got him back right away and the Doc came in to evaluate. They took him for a CT scan and when they brought him back, he started remembering what had happened. THANK GOODNESS! Because, for the past 45 minutes, he had been saying (over and over) "I don't remember crashing". So, this was progress! We just sat there and talked until Erin got there (she was SO calm, as if she had been through this before....) After we filled Erin in on what was going on, the Doc came back to say his scan was ALL CLEAR! Yippee! He just had a pretty bad concussion and some abrasions. No stitches necessary and his noggin, for the most part anyway, was just fine.

Meanwhile, back at the ranch, Lee was sad because I had promised him an oatmeal raisin cookie between laps! Little did he know, all the drama that had played out while he was out on the course! I think he has forgiven Nick for his insensitivity and selfishness. HA!

Anyway, the three of us headed back to camp so they could pick up all his stuff and his bike. Once he got back, you could tell he wasn't feeling great, but he was DEFINITELY back to his old self and was able to tell people what had happened. They grabbed his stuff and headed home for much needed rest!

Wow!!!!!

So, the rest of the day went pretty well, no more injuries, except Aaron's eye! He got stung or something, and his eye just swelled right up! Other than just people being exhausted and sore, everyone was A OK!

Lee and Marc both did 5 laps each and Dharma got a second wind and was able to push out one final lap around 11 PM for a total of 6! Way to go Dharma!! Their team did really great and I'm really proud of them!

Aside from Nick's injury, the day was really great. Great friends, great beer, and great bike riding! I can't wait to go back next year!!