Fat to Fit to Ironman

My weight chart from June 2008 to November 2012

I was never a skinny child, apart from a 2 week period around the age of 11 or so.  And though I managed to not get too overweight at university; finishing my undergraduate course (in 1995) at the same weight I started it at around 67kg; I started to slowly gain weight during my post graduate years.  I dabbled with losing weight during my undergraduate years when I got a little chubbier and that's the only real "diet" I had been on in my lifetime.

Probably around 2004 - at Clarecraft Discworld event

By 2006 I'd really gained quite a lot until one day I went to the doctor with a rotten cough, tiredness, an aching chest and feeling really rough, to be diagnosed as having a quite nasty chest infection.  And then the doctor put a sting in the tail, by saying "you're rather overweight aren't you?".  She plopped me on the scales and I was horrified to see it saying 94kg, then took my blood pressure and said I needed to be monitored as it was quite high.

That was May 8th 2006.  Packed off with a prescription for anti-biotics and an appointment for a follow-up blood pressure appointment in a month with the nurse, I left feeling shocked, depressed but also with a switch in my head flipped.  I didn't know it at the time, but this was a huge turning point in my life and instrumental in completely changing my life.  I was also in a very unhappy relationship at the time, which gave me an extra bit of ammunition which would help me on the way for the coming months.

2006 at my peak weight of 94kg

 The day after seeing the doctor, I decided to lose weight.  And I started by examining food packaging, working out calories for the day and trying to keep it under control on a day-to-day basis.  What was tricky to get info on was the values of raw ingredients rather than prepared foods, i.e. stuff like bananas, carrots, beef mince, lettuce, peppers etc. didn't have info on the packaging for me to use to work out what I was eating.  As I did (and still do) cook and prepare almost all of my food from raw ingredients rather than prepared food, this made things difficult and I increasingly found that the nutritional data I needed was available on one particular web site - Weight Loss Resources (WLR).  So after around a month of trying to lose weight (and succeeding, losing 7kg off the bat!), I decided to join the site as a member so I could make the task of counting calories, checking fruit and veg portions etc. a lot easier.

The handy thing about WLR is that it will do all of the difficult stuff for you - you input weight, height, rate of loss desired (and it won't let you specify more than 1kg a week) and it'll calculate your daily allowances for weight loss (or gain if that's what you need/want to be doing) and weight maintenance as well as having a massive database of foods, calculating the macro-nutrient splits, counting fruit and veg portions etc.  And as I stuck to my allowances religiously, week on week I lost 1kg a week like clockwork.

What also helped me be quite so focused on weight loss was that, although I didn't realise it at the time, I was very unhappy in the relationship I was in.  The process of weight loss gave me a level of control over a part of my life that was clearly missing elsewhere and, like people who self-harm by cutting themselves, I gained a sense of ownership over myself that I clearly needed.  Yes, I was mentally ready to lose weight when I did, but I also was desperate for an outlet for the feeling of having no control over my emotional well-being.

62kg the first time around

After 3 months, I hit my first weight target of "healthy BMI" (for me that was 72kg).  OK there were a few tantrums and tears along the way, but compared with a lot of people I had a pretty easy ride with no real plateaus.  But just skimming a healthy BMI, especially being very inactive (OK I walked a lot, but that's it), didn't mean I felt (or in my opinion) looked great.  So I set a new goal of 67kg which was right in the middle of the "healthy BMI" range and reached that a couple of months later.

Over the next year, my weight stayed pretty stable and then towards the end of 2007 it started to drop again.  Sadly, at that time my relationship was falling apart and despite having reached a weight I was happy with, it still kept going down.  By January of 2008, with my relationship over and having hit rock bottom emotionally, my weight bottomed out at just under 62kg.  I looked thin (to me) and not exactly happy, despite the face showing to the world.  What did make me happy was being able to go into a normal high street shop and buy clothes without being scared there would be nothing in the shop I could get into.  And I could buy clothes because I liked them and they looked good rather than them being simply big enough for me to get into them.

Shortly after that I met a man.  And we liked each other quite a bit.  He was loving, supportive and more than a little bit sporty - cycling lots and having done a triathlon once a few years ago.  So I bought a bike to cycle to his house to see him and there was sown the seed which would later grow into something really quite incredible.

Coast to coast (in Cornwall)

We cycled a bit together and after a while I got up the courage to cycle from London to Brighton with him; which filled me with a huge sense of achievement.  And we went on holiday and hired bikes together and cycled about having fun.

So, at that point I was cycling once or twice a week, doing about 10km each return trip but exercise really didn't feature on my mental radar as something I was that interested in.  Yet.

The lovely man (MrTOTKat) and I got married early in 2009.  And secretly, shortly after the wedding, I joined a gym to see about getting some strength back (having lost a lot of muscle when I lost all that weight).  A lot of ladies on the forums of WLR did weight training and the more I read and saw about it, the more I thought it was something I wanted to do.  So I did.  I discovered when we got back from honeymoon that the bathroom scales I'd been using were broken and I was, in fact, a good 5kg heavier than I thought!  So I had a bit of an effort to get that 5kg off over the following 6 months with the help of weight training as well as my new healthy eating lifestyle.

MrTOTKat and me on honeymoon

Happy with weight training and wanting to be able to eat with a bit less calorie restriction, I decided to start walking more.  Getting off the tube on the way home a stop early, then two stops, then three.  I wanted to go further but it was starting to make my commute longer than I was happy with, so I decided to try running.

My first parkrun (after my first 10K race)

Running hurt quite a bit.  So I found the Couch-2-5K (C25K) programme to follow and picked up at week 4 as I felt I could run a bit longer than the early weeks of the programme.  Running was horrible, but it meant I got home quicker and with the confidence that weight loss and my husband gave me, I felt fine about sitting on the tube in my running gear half way home before getting off to run the rest of the way.  3 months later, in October 2009, I ran my first 10K race - one of the Clapham Common 10K race series - smashed my 1 hour target, coming in at 00:57:37 (despite light stomach upset and naff all sleep the night before) and got my first sports medal of my adult life.

In 2010, after going skiing in January, not liking it much breaking my coccyx, I re-discovered swimming and signed up to do Swimathon - a 5km swim for charity in my local swimming pool.  Although it was mind-bendingly boring and I had a chest infection (again!) at the time, I managed it in under 2 hours.

Shiny!

I have no idea why, but I decided that I wanted to do a triathlon.  So, after having researched ones that were near us, involved a swim in a pool (I'd read enough horror stories about open water swims and how brutal they are), I signed up to do all four Thames Turbo Triathlon Club sprint triathlons in that year.  With a busted bum, I missed the first one, but cheered MrTOTKat on on that freezing cold Easter Monday morning and looked forward (sort of) to my first one on the next bank holiday Monday of the year.

Over the next year, we did the other sprints, and then a swim in the Thames - a first wetsuit swim for me.  Thoroughly enjoying the races, getting faster and learning at each one, we had a race signing up frenzy one drunken evening at the end of 2010.  All four Thames Turbos again, plus some of the British Triathlon Super Series, joined British Triathlon, then an Olympic distance race too - the Virgin London Triathlon.

British Olympic Ball Oct 2011

I got hit by a car while cycling to work one day in March 2011 and thereafter had an iffy knee which resulted in a number of DNFs at races.  The first was a shock, but I stopped about 1km into the run with shooting pains in my knee and stopping was the right thing to do.  It was useful to learn about DNFing as I had a good few of them over the next few months.

Working with a physio my knee got better - it turned out I just couldn't run properly and I learned to run with a mid-to-forefoot strike rather than the really quite harsh heel striking I'd been doing and that resulted in a 10km running race that I completed, then the Virgin London Triathlon (which really hurt), and the last Thames Turbo in the series.  Leaving me hungry for more races I entered the HSBC Olympic triathlon and had a horrible experience.  But by then I was already bitten by the idea that I wanted to do an Ironman.

I was looking and feeling fit, slim and confident and even having trouble with the corset I got married in being a bit too big now, though it didn't stop me from using it to glam up a night out at the British Olympic Ball!

The 2011 wall of medals and race bibs

Volunteering at a race is a great way to get a feel for it.  So, as suggested in one of the books on Ironman I'd read, I volunteered to crew at Ironman Wales.  The thinking behind Wales was that it's in the UK, so costs aren't too high, and I fear heat more than hills so Wales in September was a safe bet.  And the day we got back, we signed up for Ironman Wales in 2012, plus the UK 70.3 at Exmoor as a pre-amble earlier in the year.

From November of 2011 we were planning and training for UK 70.3 and IM Wales and everything was exciting and a bit scary, but not all that scary.  Even in March of 2012 I could visualise a 70.3 distance, maybe not with monster hills, but the distance itself didn't hold any real fear already.

 Then Mr TOTKat came across this...

"Dan James, Operations Director for IRONMAN UK, explains: “After launching the Ironman Ireland and Ironman Wales events last year some people started to talk about the ultimate test of completing our four races in one season. We thought this was incredibly hard but knew we had to recognise the achievement if someone could succeed in finishing all four in the same year.”

This is no easy feat as it will require an exceptional effort to complete over 420 miles of racing inside three months. A number of athletes, like Charlie, have already put their names forward for the challenge and Ironman have responded to the idea enthusiastically. The UK organising team have agreed to provide some extra reward for athletes who are attempting the extremely difficult task." 

My first reaction was "you're crazy!".  We've not even done a 70.3 yet, have no idea about recovery times or even how we'll cope with a 70.3, never mind a full distance.  Plus, the last two are two weeks apart!  So, I suggested that coachJoe (Mr TOTKat's coach) be consulted to see just how crazy it was. The response came back pretty much as "do it!" (with a bit more about the practical and sensible bits).  So I thought about it and...

There we were; signed up for 4x Ironman events in one year, in fact in a 13 week period:-

"As a result athletes embarking upon the ‘ultimate’ will receive special race numbers and a commemorative package including t-shirt, jacket and a unique medal as part of a special awards ceremony. A ‘Wall of Fame’ will also be created online to honour the success of those who can overcome the odds to finish all four races in the same season. "

Now I was excited.  It got to its logical conclusion; there was no more we could realistically do in 2012.  It was not going to be easy, but then it never was doing "just" the two.

As I trained, the weight dropped off even more without actually trying.  Even fuelling for the training effort and slap up meals after long sessions didn't seem to stop the downwards trend that you can see in my weight chart from November 2011 to June 2012.  

With the help of new coach Rich Jones, I had a great few races at UK 70.3 and IM UK...

IM 70.3 UK 2012

Ironman UK 2012

I was an IRONMAN!  But no time to stop and smell the roses as there were two more races to get through.

And then Ireland 70.3...

IM 70.3 Ireland 2012

And this is how it ended.  I had a bad bike crash at IM 70.3 Ireland, broke my collar bone, finished the race in a respectable time (an hour quicker than UK 70.3) and got patched up.

With less than 2 weeks to IM Wales there was no way I'd be able to swim or cycle at Wales, so that was the end of the challenge for me.  4 days before IM Wales I had a titanium plate put in to pull the two ends of my collar bone and the bits in the middle back together again and straight so it will heal properly for the future.

And at IM Wales I volunteered at the finish line and handed out all 4 race medals to my husband when he crossed the line.

MrTOTKat and his full set of Ultimate Challenge finishers medals in 2012

With a haul of medals in 2012 that anyone should be proud of, I was at peace with not finishing the Ultimate challenge.  Now, I'm looking forward to 2013 and a season of shorter races...

Stowe, Blenheim, UK 70.3, UK IM and Ireland 70.3 all in 2012

6 and a half years after I decided to drop a load of weight and I'm the fittest, healthiest, lightest, slimmest and happiest I've ever been in my adult life.  Oh and I'm an Ironman.

Shortly after the end of my 2012 season, I decided that an Ultra marathon might be interesting... so I did one in February 2013 and then ended up doing 5 in 12 months around the other races.

After Country to Capital

IM 70.3 Galway 2012 (@ironmanireland)

And this is where I spoke too soon...

4 days before Galway, I fell off my bike and got battered and scraped.  At the time I was grateful it hadn't happened 4 days before IM Wales.  Little did I know what was to come.

The day before IM 70.3 Ireland, the weather wasn't great.  Rain, winds, swell in the sea.  MrTOTKat (you can find his race report here) and I went for a little jog in the morning and then tried out the sea.  There were volunteers and safety staff from Galway Tri (I think) checking people in and out of the sea and kayakers checking on people and giving handy tips.  To be honest, it wasn't too bad, but the waves were plenty big enough to make sighting of the little orange buoys not easy and to force a large mouthful of water into my throat.  That was pretty unpleasant and I struggled not to throw up immediately.  We trundled 'round the buoys twice and then got out to sort out bikes and bags into transition.

As we got my bike together, MrTOTKat  noticed that the gear cable going into my rear mech was dinked.  On closer inspection, it was completely mashed, almost totally sheared off with only a couple of strands still intact. Argh!  Thank god for on site bike mechanics - a cheerful, silver-haired chap replaced the cable and shroud and sorted out the gear alignment problem that the Planet X has suffered since I first rode it.  All for the princely sum of €10 which he was happy to wait a couple of hours for me to go and get as we had no cash on us.  Lovely chap!

All racked up next to the pros, thanks to our Ultimate Challenge athlete numbers that stay with us through the 4 races, I decided to leave my nutrition bars (opened and cut in half) in the bento box on the bike so I didn't forget them in the morning.  It rained overnight...

A quiet, early dinner in the pub with the Stannetts (Kate and Charlie, also doing the challenge though Charlie had a horrible race at Bolton and didn't finish but is still doing the other races anyway) and in bed by 8pm.

Race morning and we have that down to a tee.  Tea, Ready Brek (you never know what will be available and at what time, so we take something that works with just hot water) with Nutella and banana in it and time to make up the race drinks.  We've been training with what's available in the races even though we should be able to be self-sufficient in this race, so we have Gatorade.  And then we discovered an error.  We had only enough to make up 2 litres of mix and we needed 3 litres between us.  Ah well, upping the solid fuel (I had planned on bagel as well as bars and gels) and taking a weak mix with mostly water in the second of our bottles would work fine.

A nice short stroll from our (absolutely gorgeous!) B&B, the Sea Breeze Lodge, we went to transition to put bottles and bagel on our bikes (and I found that my bars, although sticky on one end, had not turned into porridge in the overnight rain) and trot off to the swim start.

Unlike Wimbleball, there was a multi-wave start here, with the pros off at 7am; M18-24, M25-29 and M30-34 at 07:05; M35-29 and M50-54 at 07:20; M55-59 and all female athletes at 07:35; M40-49 at 07:50; and finally the relay teams at 08:00.

Some of the pros ran into some confusion with the first buoy location, resulting in some adding a good 3-4 minutes to their swim, so the next wave were given information on which buoy to aim for and the erroneous one was soon deflated and removed.

Always look gorgeous coming out of a swim!

MrTOTKat was off at 07:20 and I was soon after at 07:35, in the same wave as Kate and Charlie.  As I waited to get into the sea for the deep water start, I couldn't help dancing along to the great tunes and reminding myself of how bouncy and perky Lucy Gossage was before Wimbleball with the same tunes pumping.  The sea was much calmer than the day before and the swim felt pretty good.  I had no problem sighting on the first buoy, but the second was very far away and I couldn't see it for a long time, relying on other athletes and the feel of the swell of the sea to work out the direction.  I'm pretty sure I didn't take the best line and I know I didn't put in a lot of effort (looking at the HR trace afterwards :o)).  The third buoy I definitely took way too wide and only just heard the safety kayakers shouting at us to go between the last two yellow buoys for the exit.

The swim exit was up the beach, up a concrete ramp and then down the road on the same green carpet as the finish chute (nice on the feet!), across the road and into the field for transition.  I overtook quite a few people on that little trot, once I'd got my wet-suit off my arms and shoulders and down to waist level.

A reasonably quick transition with finding my blue bag quickly, dumping out the contents onto a chair, putting my (inside-out, bah!) cycling socks on, discarding my cycling jersey (forgetting it had the second spare inner tube in the pocket), jamming the all-important race belt and cycling helmet on, followed by bike shoes I trotted out to get my bike.  That lovely new Adamo seat is not only the most comfortable seat ever, but it's quite distinctive in its Union Flag colours so it's easy to spot hooked over the bike rails.  The one thing I had forgotten, which I only noticed as I approached the bike mount line, was my sunglasses.  I'd said only the day before that no matter how tempted to not bother with them, glasses would be essential on the course with the wind blowing sand all around.  A split second temptation to turn back and get them was crushed; the wind was much weaker today and I was going to risk it.

The bike course is an almost flat out and back, but the first section goes through the university and has some tight twists and turns, speed bumps and shortly afterwards a bit of rough road surface.  I found out later that Bethan Fowler (one of the pros doing the Ultimate Challenge too) crashed in that bit of the course and damaged her rear derailleur.  I again lost my front bottle over a rough bit of road, so jammed on the brakes and stopped to get it.  A kind old gent had picked it up and was walking towards me.  Noooo!  This was right in front of a race marshal, so I asked the man to put the bottle down on the ground as I couldn't accept outside assistance.  I had to speak slowly and deliberately as he was so pleased to help someone that he wasn't listening or comprehending what I was saying.  He was only trying to help but didn't know he could get me disqualified.  It was important that I got the message over, or I'd have to leave the bottle with him confused and pick one up at the aid station.  He finally got it and I picked up the bottle from the pavement, slotted it in place and headed off thanking him a few more times so he didn't think I was a total cow.

Having got loads of mud and grass wedged into my cleats in transition, I had trouble getting clipped back in and nearly had a bit of an accident with my left shoe skittering hard off the pedal, under it and bending my ankle the wrong way briefly.  At this point I was convinced I was going to have a really rubbish and slow bike leg, but finally clipped in and tried to settle down.  A chunk of bagel and some glugs of Gatorade to start the fuelling and I started to ramp up the power.

Vrooom!

As the km started ticking away, I turned up the dial until I started to fly past people.  Overtaking people from the start wave before me, I started to feel pretty good.  No burning thighs, so definitely not putting down too much power into the pedals the distance was being eaten up on this new set-up of TT bike, aero helmet and comfortable TT seat.  The support out on the course was really warm and lovely and every group of people I passed cheered, clapped, clanged cow bells and I waved at them and smiled.

Under normal circumstances, I would have been pleased with these stats. As it is, I'm actually very very pleased indeed.

For the next 40km I played over-take with the woman who ended up third in my age category before finally making it stick. Coming into the last 15km I was feeling great and still reeling in other athletes when I came to this road...

A two way road with what looks like passing lanes on the sides - demarcated by painted lines and cats eyes (which you can clearly see in the Google street view image above).  Shortly before this part of the road I think I came to a slower cyclist from an earlier wave, who I pulled out from inside the yellow lines into the main lane to overtake.  I remember hitting and going over a cats eye. 

One of these type...

I think I shouted something.  I know I fish-tailed 5 or 6 times trying to regain control of the bike, thinking "when is this going to stabilise" before finally losing the bike out from underneath me.  I was doing 34.5 km/h at the time.

I remember being on my back, shouting "help, oh god, someone help please".  Then there were people.  A man with a mountain bike and maybe some others.  I remember lying on my back saying "please don't make me stop, I have to finish, I have four of these to do".  I remember being briefly worried I'd broken my leg and then seeing a small cut on my thumb and thinking that was the only injury.  Then I remember someone pushing me on the back of my seat to get me started.  I have no idea how I got on my bike.  You can see from the Garmin stats that I was stopped for about 5 minutes and 20 seconds or so (time vs. moving time).

I have no idea how I got back the last 9ish km to transition from the crash site.  No memory of it at all.  I remember turning off my bike computer.  I remember sitting in the transition tent in the medical area, a face talking to me, but no idea what he said or who he was, and again I said that I had to finish and begged not to have to stop.  I have no memory otherwise of what happened in transition.  I have no recollection of taking off my helmet or shoes, racking my bike or getting my red bag (I suspect volunteers did a lot of it for me).  I remember putting on my left running shoe with one hand and not understanding why at the time.  I remember deciding not to put on my running cap and thinking it was a shame I didn't have my sun glasses.   I don't remember getting out on to the run course.  Apparently I was in T2 for around 15 minutes.

You can see after 03:20ish, which is a real HR drop off, that I was quite ginger getting back to T2 and was then there
for ~15 minutes before going on the run. (and forgot to turn it off at the end for a while)

Memory returns at some point on the run course when I started to talk to a guy called Jamie (I think), who recognised my name from the programme (all the Ultimate Challenge athletes are named with photos in the race programme in a double page spread) it turned out.  I was being shadowed by the medic bicycles, some of who were happy to chat and told me they'd been sent to watch over me, some hung back trying to be subtle (guys, the free-wheel clicking is a dead give-away :o)).  I knew something wasn't right as my left arm naturally gravitated to sitting with my hand latched onto my heart rate transmitter and as I passed MrTOTKat on his 2nd lap as I was on my first I let him know something was up but that I'd go to the medic tent at the end.

As I passed spectators on the run course, I kept hearing sharp intakes of breath, the odd "oh dear god", and "that's so brave".  All I knew was my arm needed to be at the angle I was holding it at and I could see a bit of a graze on the front of my left shoulder out of the corner of my eye.  What were they seeing that I couldn't?  The chap I was talking to said I had quite a graze down the back which looked nasty, so I guessed that was it.  I actually felt pretty OK as long as I held my arm in place and didn't jar things too much.  Walking the aid stations for water and a glug of energy drink, I knew I'd get to the end and it wouldn't be too shabby either.  No run PB for the distance, but not dawdling for sure.

Charlie and me

On my final lap, I came across Charlie Stannett and we ran together for a bit.  He decided to run just behind my left shoulder to shield me from accidental bumps from other athletes (what a sweetie!) and we stayed together until he finally spotted his Kate (who he'd been worried about to that point as he'd not yet seen her on the run) just as we came to the final funnel either to the finishing chute (where I was then headed) or more run laps (Charlie had another lap to go).

I saw the green carpet and launched myself down the finishing chute.  I could hear Paul Kaye, the race commentator, calling my name in almost disbelief that I was coming for the finish line (turns out I was all over the race radio from the crash onwards) and I knew the race was almost done and I could get sorted by the medics.

As I crossed the line and was handed my medal I was greeted by a medic who said they'd been waiting for me. He led me to the medical area to find a concerned-looking MrTOTKat.  We sat and I was tended to.  I asked MrTOTKat how he'd done.  Having no idea what my time was, I said "it wasn't under 6 was it?"  Little did I know at the time that I'd come in at 06:18 myself (including a 5 minute "rest" on the bike, a 15 minute "nap" in T2 and two wee stops on the run), and he said "05:22" with a big grin on his face.

Damian (or was it Derren?) the medic cleaned up my grazes and got the doctor to come and give me a shot of difene in the bum for the pain.  That took about 20 minutes to kick in and then I felt lovely.  Nobody was too sure whether my collar bone was broken or not at the time but the lack of movement and the pain level was enough to send me to hospital for x-rays to be sure.  MrTOTKat stayed behind to get our race bags, bikes and assorted stuff while I was whisked off in an ambulance to UCHG.

Long story short, I ended up stood in front of the x-ray machine while the radiographer took his x-ray.  We chatted and I was still in denial right up to saying, "I'm racing again in 2 weeks" *click*bzzzzz* (goes the x-ray machine) "No you're not".  And he showed me the x-ray.

Ow.

Up until this point, and even after, I was convinced I'd be able to carry on with the Ultimate Challenge and that everything would be fine.

I cannot in any way condone doing what I did on this day.  The drain on race safety resources who could have been needed by someone in real trouble was not a good thing to have done.  It was utterly selfish of me, but at the time I was full of adrenaline and had "race head" on.  I am glad for myself that I finished, more on why that is in another post along with the stats and analysis.

The rest is a story for another day.

Forgot to turn the run Garmin off too. But hey, not bad avg. moving pace for having a broken collar bone?

Detailed bike splits. Stopped for dropped bottle in 1st 5km, crash in 17th 5km and not sure what the stop was in the 18th 5km.

Detailed run splits - wee stop in 3rd and 14th km, total bugger to get shorts on and off with one hand!

Some perspective

Sometimes I need a bit of perspective.  I need to remember where I've come from.  I learned to ride a bike pretty much 3 years ago and then didn't do much cycling until this year.  I learned to run 2 years ago - honestly! - and did very little running until this year.  OK, I swam a LOT from the age of 3 to 11, but then stopped until I was 23, did it for a year, then stopped again until 18 months ago.  And I had a bike crash that messed up some of this year's season...

Come September next year, I'll have gone from not being able to run to an Ironman in just over 3 years.  From being completely and utterly unfit to Ironman in 3 and a bit years.

Trashed bike (probably) and helmet

On my way in to work this morning, I was about 12 minutes into my ride, maybe 15 and was flying up CS7 alongside the traffic jam of cars.  I was just at the junction of Oldridge Road and Balham High Road with a large van stationary just in front to the right of me, when a car going the other way suddenly appeared across the front of me, turning right into Oldridge Road.  I was doing about 25kph, maybe a bit more; the car was probably doing around 10kph.  I only found out about it when my front wheel was taken out by the front of the car and a second or so later I felt myself land and the back of my head hit the road.

[Yellow box is me on my bicycle travelling North in the massively wide cycle lane.  Purple boxes are stationary cars trying to go North.  Red box is large, stationary van trying to go North.  Blue box is blue car going South, turning right at the same time as I'm passing the side road.]

I screamed.  For the first time in my entire life, I screamed.  Twice.  Maybe three times.  My eyes were shut and I didn't dare open them.  There were people around me asking me to open my eyes, so I did.  I could hear a female voice saying "I'm sorry, I'm so sorry.  Is she OK?" over and over.  My knees hurt, my head felt a bit funny and I didn't want to move.  They were all asking me was I OK, then one guy seemed to have some medical training and asked me my name, looked at my eyes, checked my grip, spine, hips and shoulders and then decided it was OK to get me moved.  I was keen to get out of the way of the traffic, but people kept telling me not to worry about it.

My bike was moved for me, I have no idea where it ended up first of all; I think it went over the car.  The car that hit me was behind me, so I must have gone right over the bonnet.  My shoes unclipped totally from the pedals pretty much immediately the impact happened, which is a relief.  With all the adrenaline bubbling about, I told everyone I was fine and totally intended to carry on in to work and that no, I didn't need any of the three ambulances that had been called for me.  No really, I'm fine.  The guy who checked my back and brain were mostly OK advised me to get me bike checked out before riding it again in case the headset was damaged which I thought, mm I'll do that on the way home tonight.

The woman that hit me took me for a cup of tea and I really did intend just to get on my bike and carry on in to work.  As we got up to leave the cafe, I looked down at my right knee and saw two huge lumps on it as well as the graze.  The woman was advising me to go home and have a hot bath, which was sounding more and more inviting by the minute.  My neck was starting to get sore and my jaw hurt as I opened it, so I thought I'll just check my bike in to the bike shop over the road for a check-over and head to a walk-in clinic to get myself checked over.

As I walked my bike to wait for the bike shop to open, I noticed something catching every revolution of the wheels.  So I lifted up the back and spun the back wheel - tiiiiiiiny bit wobbly but not catching on the brakes.  Did the same with the front... not so good.  Bent.  And looking at the right side of the front forks for the first time, I saw that they were broken.  Feeling a bit sick and headachey by this point I decided to go to St. Georges A&E to get properly checked out.

Then the shock finally started to wear off a bit and I was in floods of tears all the way to the hospital.  Snotty and sniffling, tears streaking down my cheeks.  By this point I couldn't turn my head to check for traffic coming in roads to the right of me, so had to turn my whole body to do that.

I locked my bike up outside the hospital and went in to A&E to register.  Only to get totally told off by the triage nurse for not coming in an ambulance, bumped to the front of the queue and told I was being treated as 'trauma' as I -should- have come in an ambulance especially given I went over the bonnet of the car.  I'm terrible.  I don't like making a fuss.  I don't like going to the doctor unless something is pretty much hanging off.  I really need to get over that.  That said, while I was in A & E waiting to be seen by a doctor, I heard a call come in for another accident - 20 minutes away in the ambulance; pedestrian vs. cyclist at 30mph.  Brain bleeding, BP very high, other internal injuries, suspected probably won't survive the ambulance journey.  I don't know if that was the pedestrian or the cyclist, but I'd suspect the pedestrian at that speed.  I didn't find out in the end.

At this point, I felt very lucky.

The doctor came and... long story short, my BP and heart rate were very high (I still had my heart rate monitor on and it didn't drop below 100 even after sitting down for 20 minutes).  Spine, hips, shoulders and brain checked out OK.  Knees and calves just badly bruised, scraped and a bit lumpy.  Neck and jaw minor injuries that would need ice packs for a few days and Ibuprofen to treat.  No work for at least 2 days, no gym or cycling for 2 weeks.  Immediate treatment with diclofenac (and some bread and butter and tea to help make it easier on the stomach) and 2 hours observation before being discharged with a letter sent to my GP detailing the injuries.

Home now and my bike is in for  a safety check with a definite broken front fork, very likely needing replacement front wheel, maybe replacement back wheel (might be fixable, might not).  They're going to check the frame to see if/how much it is bent and the brakes, gears, crank etc.  It's going to be a toss up whether it's a write-off or not, but given the cost of the safety check, replacement front fork, replacement front wheel, replacement or trueing of rear wheel and labour as a definite cost to fix it up safe to ride... it's sailing close to the original cost of the bike anyway.  If it is going to cost loads to fix it up, I'll get the pedals and a few other bits off it and scrap the rest.

Annoyingly, my camera is out of battery and I'm too tired/sore to go find the charger, so here's a list of the injuries:-

• Left knee - bruised on top and both sides, grazed on the top and left side
• Left calf - large bruise 
• Right knee - tangerine-sized lump on the left with a graze, egg-sized lump on top with a graze, large scrape down the right side of the calf behind the knee
• Left side of jaw - sore to open
• Left side of back of neck, very very sore
• Bottom of neck, both sides and spreading out across the back of my shoulders - very very sore
• Right side of back of head - bruised/sore

My bicycle helmet - bent plastic and compressed polystyrene at the middle on the back and cracked polystyrene right through on the back, left side (where it hit the road).  That has to be replaced.  Anybody that ever tells me that people shouldn't wear cycling helmets will get an unpleasant response from me.  I always thought it's better to wear one than not and now... well, given how hard my head hit the road I'm pretty sure I wouldn't be sitting here back at home by now if I hadn't been wearing a helmet.  I'm pretty sure I would have been in an ambulance earlier and not telling people I was fine.  I'm pretty sure I'd have more than a slightly sore bit on the back of my head.

Bicycle - front fork cracked right through (not fixable), front wheel buckled (not fixable), back wheel a bit bent (may be fixable), frame and crank etc. being checked out.

I need to go and find Ibuprofen now.  And sort out more ice for the rest of the day.  Everything aches.  My neck and shoulders hurt a lot unless I slouch in a bad way and I'm feeling washed out and tired.  I've already eaten 4 slices of bread (two in the hospital with butter on and two toasted with Marmite when I got home) 'cause I'm starving hungry but I don't care what I eat today as long as I do eat.   I want to nap, but that's a bad idea unsupervised at the moment, so I'll try not to do that for at least a few more hours if not normal bed-time.

Time to count my blessings and drink tea with kittens cuddled up.