Santa Barbara, CA.  Warning:  Should Denmother and Winston PM and invite you on a ride, politely decline and add both screen names to your ignore list.

It was a beautiful day for riding in Santa Barbara.  Denmother and Roger, B-Rad and Curtis had attended a wedding on Saturday.  While Mechmann, Allison, Marshall Willanholly, cbharping and myself came up to ride.  Carla aka cbharping was a little reluctant to tackle the SB chunk but Denmother and I assured her it would be a good time.  (First timers = Allison, Meckmann, cbharping & Marshall Willanholly.)

Tunnel would be first up on the menu.

Marshall Willanholly getting his first taste:

Same with Allison:

Denmother:

Roger stayed in the back to sweep and give cbharping a little coaching.

cbharping gets a close look at line possibilities:

That body armor came in handy.

Denmother leads the way:

cbharping rolling through:

Roger sweeping:

Taking a break after the first extending chunk.  Left to right: Mechmann, Marshall Willanholly, cbharping, Allison, unknown and Roger dealing with his weepy Totem:

Continuing on, Mechmann:

Marshall Willanholly:

Allison:

Denmother:

Roger:

cbharping coming thru!

About half way down Tunnel, I was bringing up the rear with cbharping to my front.  Mechmann was shooting a video clip of Roger up ahead.  The trail narrowed with exposure to the right.  cbharping stopped and put out the “aero dab.”  She and her bike tumbled off the trail.  (Mechmann saw this as well as he finished shooting the video clip of Roger.)

The oohs and ahs from cbharping started.  I figured she would only fall 10 yards, but the oohs and ahs kept coming and coming, which was frightening.

She came to a rest maybe 50 yards off the trail.  Her bike was part way down and to the right upside down against a bush.  Her goggles were hanging from a tree branch:

Mechman and I went quickly over the side to help.  Mechmann must have been wearing his Superman UnderRoos, because he was down to cbharping within moments.  I stopped halfway down, to allow Mechmann time to assess the situation and also to avoid kicking rocks down on top of them.

She was shaken up but fortunately did not have life threatening injuries.  She complained of some back pain but was willing to tough out the climb.

Roger is on hand to provide help from above:

Working their way up with Mechmann always willing to help a girl out:

Back on the trail:

cbharping was in no condition to ride out so we started the hike down.  cb leaned on Marshall Willanholly for support while Roger, B-rad and Mechmann worked the bike shuffle.

(Sometimes pushing two bikes and sometimes riding a bike down a ways and running back up the trail for another.  B-rad and Mechmann’s specialty.  We also caught a break when a concerned hiker walked cb’s bike down.)

B-rad and Mechman working the bike relay:

Denmother riding a short segment:

B-rad accepting the Roger says ride this line challenge:

Once we got down to the first fire road section, cbharping was able to remount her bike and coast down with a little help here and there on those annoying short ups.

Obviously cbharping & Marshall Willanholly would called it a day.  cb was in good spirits as they loaded up to head back down south.

Cbharping got herself checked out at her Urgent Care Facility where it was discovered that she has a compression fracture in her lower back.  She will see an Orthopedic on Monday and is on good drugs.  (No movement restrictions and she is resting comfortably at home..)

Now was cb the only person to fall off Tunnel today?  Ah, no…Curtis managed to get off line on a narrow section, but used his cat like reflexes and only slide maybe 10 yards off the trail.  His bike stayed on the trail.

Get well soon Carla!!!

PS – Allison’s Totem was having sympathy pains:

That sucks BIG TIME. I wish her a fast and full recovery.

Winston, get a good look at that totem, your 40 is gonna look just like that real soon.

ps. word of advice, dont ride with Winston. J/K buddy

shitty

Sadly I didn't hear all these 40s spewing oil stories till after I bought the fork.  On a positive note the 40 with the softer spring felt great compared to my last Santa Barbara trip.

Roger's Totem started spewing after 4 rides.  B-rad says that Roger can get a shot for that. 

Carla's reply on STR letting us know that she is gonna be ok.  PHEW!!! 

cbharping:

That's a great trail, I look forward to doing the whole thing one day??? And Cold Springs, maybe better ride karma for me there!

Well, I did have a great time...up until the crash! It's still surreal to me thinking back on it. I've been replaying the crash sequence in my head, it's hard not to! You just never expect that sort of thing to happen to you or anyone you know. Luckily I was with a great group of riders who were there in an instant to offer support and plenty of jokes!

Went to get checked out yesterday and by my Dr. today. I do have a compression fracture in one of the upper lumbar (lower back) vertebrae - nothing to really do for it except rest, ice, and anti-inflammatories. It hurts, but I'm so thankful it wasn't worse!

Thanks to Denmother and Roger, for their coaching and line-choice leads (in the beginning when I was riding, of course)! And extra thanks for Roger for making bad jokes along the way back to keep me laughing!

Thanks to Mechmann for being there so FAST after I crashed and for giving such great support...in more ways than one.

Thanks to Winston for that final pull up from the trenches and all the pushes up the hill! And thanks to Allison and Winston for all the cool pics!

And thanks to the unknown hiker who spent part of her hike walking my bike out to the fire road.

Glad to hear she is fine.  Must have been scary tumbling down the trail that far...

Less than 2 month to Fontucky racing.

Carla

 Glad to hear you're doing okay.  Like Frenchy said, Fontucky is less than two months away, it won't be the same without you there!  Get well soon!

 Auk

Thanks everyone for the well wishes! I really appreciate it. I'm quite bummed I'll have to miss the demo day at Fontana, but I'm crossing my fingers for Fontucky race in November!

 Thanks Winston, for the temporary feature pic on the front page! And thanks again for making it an upright one.
 

Update from Eric aka Skullcrack aka Marshall Willanholly (from STR)

Skullcrack:

Wow, what a day! CB and I were both looking forward to our first trip down Tunnel and were really happy to be riding with Nancy, Roger, Winston, Allison, Justin, and B-Rad. I was expecting the trail to be chunky, but I was surprised at how long the chunky sections were. It took me a little while to get warmed up and find some flow. I met up with B-rad near the end of a particularly rocky section and we hung out for a while waiting for the rest of the group. We were getting a little concerned as we had been waiting for quite a while. Finally a rider came down and mentioned that someone had gone over the edge about 1/3 of a mile back so we started hiking back up as quickly as we could.

When we reached them, I was so relieved to see CB on her feet and walking, albeit painfully. I can't believe how tough CB is. She was in a lot of pain, and hiking down the rough and rocky sections of that trail must have been excruciating. She refused to stop and rest, saying she'd rather tough it out and get back to the car as soon as possible. I was also surprised to see a hiker we passed earlier walking CB's bike down. Bikers and hikers working together on Tunnel; that's something you don't hear about every day.

Once back at the truck, we debated on where to go for medical attention. "Tough as nails" CB decided she wanted to tough out the ride down south to beat the traffic. It ended up being a good decision as we made it home very quickly, with just one stop at a fast food joint for a bathroom break and a little food. The looks she got going in wearing her body armor were priceless. Roger had wisely suggested keeping the armor on as the backplate and torso belt were keeping everything in her back more stable.

We found an Urgent Care center that was both open on Sundays and had an X-ray machine. They got her in and out in under an hour. MUCH better than a long wait in a hospital emergency room. The preliminary diagnosis was a compression fracture of the 1st lumbar vertebrae. They sent her X-rays to a radiologist for another opinion and gave her a prescription for Vicodin. She's been taking it easy ever since, and I've refrained from asking her if she's even shorter now.

Thanks again to everybody on the ride. It was amazing and wonderful to watch a group of people, some who we hadn't even met before, respond the way they did. Thank you all.

Since we didn't get a chance to take any of our own photos, and these ride reports are boring without them, here are CB's x-rays:

Here's a view from the side:



Now, I'm not too good at reading x-rays, but from this one, it looks like mechmann's assistance didn't end here:


How he got into the doctor's office is beyond me. I'll be so bummed if CB calls me "Justin" the next time I grab her ass.

Damn, I've been reading this off and on for a couple of days now, and even though I don't know you CB or SC I am glad that you're ok.  Good thing that you were able to ride/walk yourself out of there.  It must have really sucked being in SC's position while waiting for the rest of the group and hearing from a hiker that "someone went over the edge", and then frantically trying to hike back up.

I hate seeing this kind of stuff because it hit close to home before (when my wife was injured) and even though it just goes along with the territory of mtb'ing it always hurts to see folks get injured.

(Ya' gotta keep an eye on that Mechmann - he was grabbing JOD's belly while in Kernville)

D

Thanks DD, we're both very happy that it wasn't worse. I really feel horrible that I was so far ahead and not able to be there to help get CB back to the trail.

She's pretty sore, but trying to minimize the amount of pain meds she's taking and bummed that she won't be on the bike for a while. I know she was really looking forward to the Southridge Demo Days in a couple weeks to try some DH bikes.

 I remember reading about JOD's accident, and was really glad to see that she was able to get back to riding. BTW, congratulations on the upcoming new arrival to your family!

 

Glad to hear cb is okay.  Props to everyone for their efforts in helping.  Tunnel is relentless, but that's why we love it, eh? 

Just glad to hear the good news that cb is able to rest, relax and joke now.