7 Is Not The Luckiest Number Of Them All

When I received my bib number for last weekends race the woman said, oh you have the luckiest number of them all - 777. As soon as she said this, I knew that triple 7 was going to bring me anything but luck; really I'm not superstitious at all! The next morning when I showed up for body marking, the guy marking me made the comment, "oh you're going to have a lucky race," as he wrote 777 on my arm - really this is why I'm a huge fan of ipods so I don't have to freak out over comments like this.

I quickly forgot about the "lucky" comments, got into my race groove and was happy coming out of the water:

Then the crash happened, which turned out to vastly more unlucky than I had previously thought. Not only did the crash screw up my overall time for the Patriots International, but its going to turn out costing me a cr*p load of money. I cracked my freaking frame!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

As I was cleaning my bike off on Tuesday and about to load it onto my trainer for my recovery ride; I noticed some sort of mark on the top tube - upon closer inspection this was anything but a mark, it was the most evil sight any triathlete can see on their beautiful carbon frame.

So my options are to use Orbea's crash replacement program which allows me to purchase a new frame and fork for retail cost; which 3 sports in Richmond can have for me built up this weekend. Or can I go with a company in California called Calfee which repairs carbon frames; this will cost about $1,000 less than the replacement frame (including shipping) but I will miss the South Carolina Half as the turn around time for a Calfee repair is 30 to 50 days. I'm not sure whats worse, missing a race and being without one of my favorite things or spending a bit of extra money and not missing a beat.

This decision has me feeling like this:

full disclosure: I've been making faces at cameras in races for a while - I finally timed it right!