Originally Posted by
jasper
It's a long story :)
I was a racing snake in those days, I used to be on the RAF cycle team. Anyway, in '91 we cycled up and down Mount Olympus, Cyprus for a training ride. The next day, we still had the stiff legs so I suggested throwing the bikes in the van as we were working on the radar on top of the mountain, and cycling down to spin out the latic acid. The top of the mountain is so steep that we were doing around 70mph, overtaking cars, and being general dicks. We could have gone slower if we sat up and hadn't pedalled, but we were on the drops and gunning it, as you do. Once it flattened out a bit, there was a S bend. I got around the first corner (which would have thrown me off the mountain had I come off), but got a front wheel puncture going in to the second bend.
As I was going off the road, I remember thinking that I should be ok, but my wheels will be fucked as there was a bondoo drain at the side of the road, filled with large rocks that had slid down the mountain. Just then, there was a dirt track that went over the drain to the road. The drain was bridged by the track with a concrete sewer pipe and as I was rattling along the drain, thinking all would be ok, I hit the pipe at about 40mph.
I remember waking up in the van with claret everywhere. The lads were with me and they took me to a local village doctor, who basically threw iodine all over my face and then the lads radioed in for me to be medevac'd. I was a bit more lucid by the time I was on board the RAF helicopter and I remember saying to my mate, that I thought I'd broken my nose. The look on his face, told me it could be a little worse.
On arrival at RAF Akrotiri, they took me to the Med Centre to be stitched. The nurse was asking me the usual questions to keep me awake and make sure I was still with it. One of the questions she asked was my name. She'd fucked my brains out a few months before, so that pissed me off as I thought I must've been a shit lay :) But I was so unrecognisable that she hadn't realised who I was. Some nurse she turned out to be, she had to hand over the stitching to someone else as she felt sick, once she knew who I was.
They then transported me to the hospital on camp, where I had all the tests, X-rays, etc. I had broken both eye sockets, both cheek bones, my collar bone, my jaw, nose (told you :) and severe lacerations all over my head, face and upper body. They then flew a specialist out from the UK and he operated on me the next day.
I had to spend 3-4 weeks in hospital and for most of that time, ablutions consisted of either bed baths or being escorted to the shower, where a nurse would watch me shower to make sure I was ok. My eyes/face were so badly swollen that I was blind. Anyway, on the day I was to be discharged, I was allowed to shower by myself. So, as I was going to be seeing my girlfriend later that day, I thought I'd blow the tubes out so I wasn't a two squirt wonder.
I don't know if it was a little too much for me in my condition, or the heat (remember it was summer in Cyprus, so the temp was about 35C, without the heat from the shower). but as the blood began to boil and the sap started to rise up little Paulie, I passed out and came too on the floor. I had fallen sideways out of the shower and whacked my head on the side of a bath. I don't know how long I had been unconscious but I was still groggy when I tried to get up. There was blood all over the floor and I was in panic, thinking that I had tore open my face again.
Once I realised my face wasn't bleeding, I then noticed that my earlobe was flapping down. In panic again, I was looking on the floor for a bit of my ear until I realised that it wasn't missing, but just badly torn. I wiped the cum from my belly, wrapped a towel around me and went to find the Sister and told her that I'd cut myself shaving :) She wasn't stupid though, she knew I'd blacked out (just not the reason why :) and told me to get back in bed before I pass out again.
And so the Doctor came and declared me unfit to be discharged and that he couldn't operate on local and had to do it on general anaesthetic. I went to surgery a little later and had to spend two more days in hospital for observations, in case I blacked out again.
Until the day of my accident; I hadn't broken a bone, had stitches or knocked myself out...and so I decided to make up for lost time and do it in one go :) I had to have another couple of operations on my nose to help with breathing and my cheekbones and eye sockets are held together with wire.
My bike was a write off and it took me about 4 months to get it back as the Cypriot police were keeping it for evidence as they thought I had arranged an illegal road race. They dropped the charges eventually. I flew home that Christmas and had a bike custom built which I continued to race with throughout my RAF career. This has sat gathering dust ever since I retired from racing, but earlier this year, I rebuilt it with modern parts, only the frame and forks are original and even they have been re-chromed. It now looks too sexy to use though, so may put it on the wall.
I've just started to race again this year and it bloody hurts. I gave up in '96, with a little stint in '08, so I have bought a TT bike as well as another road bike, a CX bike for winter use and I'm building a track bike for use on the Velodrome. The beauty is, I'm now classed as a Veteran, so have an excuse to be slow these days :)
I have never told this story to my family :) I have loads similar, I would write a book relaying my misadventures, but everyone would think that it's too far fetched to be true
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