Road rash

I was just thinking on a recent run on my path how many hundreds of time I've gone back and forth. Soon enough, you see enough things, like mishaps. Back in 2006, a rollerblader hit a rock right as he was speeding around the corner. I was right there, helped him out, and called an ambulance. It was the one or two times I've ever run with my cellphone with me.

On Friday, I saw a rollerblader in the distance do a spin, then fall. Looked like any other fall, but when I came upon her, I saw blood dripping. She asked me to grab her iPod that she dropped a ways back and I fetched it but when I came back I saw that there was more blood missing and that's when I saw that it wasn't a scrape on her chin. She had a gash that definitely would need stitches. We hunted her backpack and there was a white towel. We got her blades off and shoes on and I handed her cellphone to her. She called her mom. I asked some event staff for a canoe/kayak race whether they had first aid people. They didn't, but we went to the staff. Luckily, she wasn't bleedly badly but I'm kinda glad she didn't see the wound, it wasn't looking pretty.

Anyways, I'm sure she's fine but it got me thinking again about getting injured on the trail. Lesson learned: When you're rollerblading, wear wristguards so you can at least put your hands in front of you. And second, when you see someone take a spill, stop and help. So many runners and cyclists just went by -- it could have been a lot worse.

Mileage was pretty good this week, up to 66 miles or about 106K. Today was supposed to be an MP run but I just didn't have it in me, and settled for a 30K run that progressively got faster.

Next week will be a stepback week -- partly because R. is coming to town and also because we have two nights of U2 (her favourite band). That's fine, I could use a little breather.