An Homage to Brave Soldier

This is why we shave ALL the way up..grrrr tape and hair on your butt=more pain

Hup and Fohu have lost some flesh over the last couple of weeks. Maybe its the end of summer we are all tired and we are writing checks our bodies can't cash. Who knows perhaps our Mercury has gone retrograde...for me it is second nature dealing with wounds and injuries. It is pretty much in my DNA. Part of it is I am accident prone (thankfully I have outgrown most of it now its only bike related!) The other part is my family DNA. When you have a grandfather who you are named after who was an Army surgeon and was trapped in Bastogne during the Battle of the Buldge and a mother who was an er nurse you have a pretty could gene pool for dealing with injuries. Suffice it to say the sight of blood doesn't bother me. My earliest recollection of crashing a bike was when I was about 10 years old. We used to do races around my block. One racer took the high road and the other took the low road. It was a circle and you could spy through the houses to see where your rival was and plan out your sprint to the cul de sac...I was eyeballing my nemesis too much and forgot to keep my eyes on the road. I hit a parked station wagon full on flew over the car landed on the hood and rolled onto the pavement. I was fine other than my jean leg was really wet. Weird. I hit the hood ornament on the way over the car and had a massive gash on my knee. I rode home and showed it to my mom who proceeded to wash it off, push the fat back in, and slap a butterfly bandaid back on gave me an oreo and said ok "you're all set get back out there and play with robbie sullivan" You'd get a call from the DSS if you tried that shit with a kid these days. But I was fine and riding my bike like nothing happened.

If I could hit the reset button I probably would have made a better emt or nurse or pt than an artist...frankly art school was a big waste on me. It was cool and all that but 160k cool....maybe not so much. But I digress. The point is even experienced bikers don't always know how to deal with road rash. In my fascination with patching myself up I stumbled upon a company that embraces road rash called Brave Soldier. They make some fantastic products and offer up a great article on dealing with road rash but here in a nutshell is how I deal with it. Now obviously I am NOT a dr, I don't even play one on tv, this is what has worked for me. If you have any doubts etc go to your dr. If it is red and streaky go to your dr. If it swells up and gets hot go to your dr...ok you get the point. But here goes. Ok so get home the best you can. Get your crash pack. Crash pack you say? Brave Soldier sells a good one or just go to CVS and get:

toothbrush--oh you'll need a toothbrush trust me

Bacitracin or other antiseptic 

Neosporin

Second Skin!!!

Big bandages

Tape

Sterile gauze pads

surgical Gloves-the gloves are for anytime you are putting neo on the wound or cleaning it

Advil/ibuprofen

Tegraderm-although after my last road rash I am off tegraderm and on second skin with a big bandaid over it.

Step 1. Now hit the shower with some anti-bacterial soap and the toothbrush...You will probably need to scream at a few points. It will sting but you have to scrub and get ALL the dirt/debris out of the wound. Now when I say wound I mean road rash. If you have a wound ie a deep cut and you can see into it go to the er and get stitches and professional help. One product that is nice is Brave Soldier First Defense. Basically its a spray antiseptic. They say it doesn't sting but it does.

Step 2. Get out of the shower and dry off. Use something sterile like the gauze pads pad dry the wound. Clean it with the bacitracin. Put on Neosporin or Brave Soldier ( I like brave soldier) Put on the second skin pad, put a big bandage over that. You might have to tape it on if its a big rr.

Step 3. Ibuprofen and relax however you can. If you hit hard put some ice on it asap. Frozen pees are good. Take a supplement like fish oil to help with inflamation. Whole foods has nice organic type fish oil.

Step 4. Change the dressing 2x a day. Keep it covered and wet with medicine. If your tetnus isn't up to date get a booster. 

That's it in a nutshell. Good luck and hopefully Hup has burnt all its crash Karma in readiness for Cross season!