9.14.13 Bike Crash

I have been riding my bike for the past 2.5 years without a major incident and that changed today.  My goal was about 75 miles.  I met the Endurshark group at Murrell Park at Lake Grapevine.  In order to get my miles, I left the house around 6:15am to get an early 20 miles in before the group ride.  My wife was running with them at 6:30 and she packed some ice and water for me to refuel with prior to the group ride.  I was able to get about 21 miles in before the ride.  Shelby planned the Jeter loop for the group.  It's about 10 miles to the loop.  Based on what each person was training for determined the number of loops.  I planned five loops.  There are some good hills on the loop and the wind was pretty stiff for the east part of the route.  We ran it counterclockwise and I'm not real familiar with riding the roads in that direction.  The first two loops were fine.  After the halfway point on the third loop, I was in my aero bars and hit a pothole.  My elbow slid out of the pad and rotated my front wheel to the right.  It gets really weird from here.  The bike came out from under me and it felt like I was floating horizontally to the ground.  The front wheel steered my bike to the right off the road towards a fence.  My feet stayed clipped in and I kind of planted in some soft dirt that kept me from flying into a fence.  A truck skidded to a stop and asked if I was ok and I sent him on.  One of the people riding with us was fairly close behind me and she stopped to see if I was ok.  I was checking my arms and legs and there wasn't a cut on me anywhere.  However, she informed me I had landed right in the middle of a fire ant mound.  In the shock of the crash, I didn't realize there were ants everywhere.  I had to clip out and then get the ants off of me.  A few other people in the group stopped and everyone helped to get the ants off of me.  They were all over from head to toe.  After most of the ants were off, I had to fix my chain and my brakes.  There were no scratches on my bike with the exception of the outside of my pedal on the side of the bike that laid down on the ground.  I must have never hit the ground until I went off the road.  Fairly fortunate.  I finished my five loops and then finished the ride back to the house.  I'll need to get my bike checked out but it looks ok.  Could have been worse.  It was the most elevation gain I have had in a ride to date per my Garmin.  My legs were toast when I got home.  Long run tomorrow.  I'm not sure how that will work out.

http://connect.garmin.com/activity/375607271