Mountain Cog
Mountain bike podcast that will make you laugh and learn. Featuring a wide range of passionate guests. Available everywhere (Apple, Spotify etc).
Mountain Cog
136 - Crash, Heal, Repeat: Mountain Biking After an Injury
Use Left/Right to seek, Home/End to jump to start or end. Hold shift to jump forward or backward.
How do mountain bikers actually wipe out? Josh went digging and found a study that looked at 534 mountain bike crash videos. Just over half were over-the-bars crashes, about half happened on moderate descents, 64% came from poor jump landings, and three quarters were at speeds of 18.6 mph or faster. Josh, who admits he rides cautiously and never jumps, takes that as a green light to keep doing exactly what he's doing. Dane has a few opinions, and a parking lot crash story that doesn't help the "just go slower" theory.
Episode 136, "Crash, Heal, Repeat: Mountain Biking After an Injury," goes from the numbers to the hard part, which is recovery. Dane and Josh talk about the difference between crashing and getting hurt, learning how to fall, pads and protective gear, and why the mental side of coming back from a crash can take longer than the physical side. Expect plenty of stories from Angel Fire, Whistler, and Tucson, plus a few ways to ride smarter without giving up the fun.
Injury Mechanisms in MTN Biking: A Systematic Video Analysis of 534 Cases
Link: https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC12177224/
Listen to Mountain Cog
Apple Podcasts
Spotify
Other Podcast Sites
Socials
Instagram
Facebook
Email
mountaincog@gmail.com
Mic Chaos And Shop Setup
Host - Dane HigginsI don't think I can do that.
Host - Josh AndersonI don't know how to make the however you're doing it. Good lord, dude. Already. We just started. I know. 20 seconds in, and you're already like still messing with your mic, making a bunch of background sounds. We need to start this thing over. It just moved. No. We're committed. We're committed now. We're committed. Alright, Wednesday night in the MCP here in Guru Bikes. We've been doing a lot of podcasts here. Uh today I had to bring a bike in to get fixed, so I was like, hey Dane. Dane's been like, hey, we'll do it at your place. I'm like, no, no, no, I gotta bring a bike in.
Host - Dane HigginsSo I know I gotta pay back and be at your place for like two months.
Host - Josh AndersonWe'd love your thoughts on this. So my wife has got a switchblade and she had it up at a bike park uh last week, and it's got some, we think, some negative air chamber issues with it. It's got a 36 on it, and we were kicking around like, should we fix it? Should we buy a new one? We're all into this rock shock suspension right now with the buttercups and all that stuff. And so I said, Dane.
Host - Dane HigginsButter wagon.
Host - Josh AndersonButter wagon. Oh, this is gonna have the new new one. Is it a 3.2 damper?
Host - Dane HigginsI don't I can't keep track. It's probably a 3.2115. We want like it's a something somewhat like an Apple update. Yeah.
Host - Josh AndersonWe went back and forth um between putting a lyric and putting a Zeb on a switchblade. We decided, uh, with Dane's help guiding us to go with the lyric. So what do you think, listeners? Was that the right or the wrong decision?
Host - Dane HigginsYeah, would you do a 160 lyric? So lyrics top out at 170. Yeah. That's the most you can get on a 29 on the new ones anyway. And then um, would you have rather have a 160 lyric or step down a 170 Zeb to 160 and run it? So that's interesting. So I think I think it's just gonna depend on who you are and how much you weigh.
Host - Josh AndersonAnd she's and she's light, she's 130 pounds or something. So she's a light girl. Um, and she likes to ride poppy and loose, so yeah.
Host - Dane HigginsEffectively, they're essentially the same fork. Just one's 35 mil stanchions and the other one is 38 mil.
Host - Josh AndersonAnd about three-quarters of a pound difference between the two, right? Yes. Or two-thirds of a pound.
Host - Dane HigginsPhysically, the overlap, you know, you've
Suspension Fork Choices For A Switchblade
Host - Dane Higginsgot uh the smaller stanchions is a little bit, but you got less overlap to go 180, you know, 170 fork just has less metal in it.
Host - Josh AndersonAnd I would imagine lyric's gonna be flexier than the zebs, gonna be super stiff.
Host - Dane HigginsI think so, but again, 35 versus 38. At her weight.
Host - Josh AndersonMaybe at my weight, it'd probably be a little bit more.
Host - Dane HigginsYeah, but for you, I would it would have been a no-brainer zebra. Just put the zeb. Yep.
Host - Josh AndersonAll right, man, you might hear it in my voice, but uh I'm not feeling great today.
Host - Dane HigginsOh.
Host - Josh AndersonUm well it's a weekday. Yeah, and uh what I think with what's been happening is that like I'm only getting sick on the weekdays. That makes sense. Yeah, yeah. You want to know why? Why? I think I've got a theory. Okay. I think it's because I have a weekend immune system.
Host - Dane HigginsWeak ass. Yeah, I'm not gonna. That's not as bad as some of the jokes.
Host - Josh AndersonOh no, I still can't hear you again. Something's happened. What did I do?
Host - Dane HigginsDid I touch something?
Host - Josh AndersonNo, you didn't do it. Oh, I'm gonna have to cut that shit out of the podcast now. Maybe I'll just leave it in. Maybe I'll just get lazy and like leave it a heck.
Host - Dane HigginsYou know, we're allowed to have technical difficulties. We have a couple every once in a while. Yeah. I mean, you do an amazing job of cleaning this up, and yeah, I think our listeners can hear the sound quality because they don't only listen to us, they're listening to other podcasts, and oh my god, some of them are awful.
Host - Josh AndersonI'm like, bros, please just give me a call, I can help you.
Host - Dane HigginsLike, I have maxed out the volume on my my car stereo while I'm driving, listening to some podcasts, and then some guest will come on and just blow my speakers out because they're just their levels are so bad.
Host - Josh AndersonIt's hilarious. One of the main things I have to do because Dane is a low talker, is uh and and doesn't have the same mic awareness that I do growing up as a musician for years and years, but um I have to always like pull it down channel by channel and then adjust Dane's volume up to match my booming loud voice. Today I tricked him.
Host - Dane HigginsIt's it's so I keep moving my mic. If you guys hear that, uh he turned down my headphones so I talk louder.
Host - Josh AndersonSo I've tricked him into talking louder so that he can hear himself.
Host - Dane HigginsI keep thinking my mic's too far away.
Host - Josh AndersonBut the volume sounds, I'm looking at the levels and it sounds perfect right now. Oh my god.
Host - Dane HigginsLittle scene into our lives.
Host - Josh AndersonYeah, right on.
Why Injuries Linger In Your Head
Host - Josh AndersonAll right. So um another episode that Dane uh suggested and kind of designed for us. Um, and this is about getting back on the bike after an injury. Uh, and we thought it'd be cool because you actually are going through this recently.
Host - Dane HigginsYeah, this is a real thing that I'm dealing with.
Host - Josh AndersonAnd so so uh what I would suggest is why don't you just tell the story to our listeners like what you're going through, and then we can kind of get into the general topics.
Host - Dane HigginsYeah, because all of the things on this little outline that I made are kind of hitting and it's kind of they're hitting home. So uh in our um Whistler episode, I kind of talked about how I rode a little more timid and still recovering after breaking my collarbone at Angel Fire, which we're going to Angel Fire soon, so I get to battle those demons. Um and so this I wanted to have an episode about you know recovering from crashes, recovering from injury, and kind of what I'm going through, which is my body heals way faster than my mind does. And so how I'm I I get on the bike and I can kind of recover, and I'm starting to build up my stamina and my my you know small muscles that control my bike, but my brain is the hardest one. That's the hardest thing on my body to fix, is my brain. And so I'm struggling with that. And so it was it was over a year ago, maybe a year ago? It was about a year ago, yeah.
Host - Josh AndersonYou attempted the wall ride at uh Angel Fire in in a in a in a hail storm.
Host - Dane HigginsYeah, I was gonna say, like just to be clear, I did that wall ride all weekend, no problem.
Host - Josh AndersonAnd by definition, it was the last run. It was it was too. It was the last run. It actually was the last day. Didn't you like ride up? I did because the lift was closed.
The Angel Fire Wall Ride
Host - Dane HigginsThe lift was closed for lightning. Yeah. Uh they closed the lifts to protect the lifts and keep people off, I think. I I don't know if it's just for the lift, but if it they don't want the lift getting hit with people on it. And um, and so I decided I had my e-bike, so I got my e-bike and I there's a up trail. So I jumped on the up trail and just was gonna ride for a little while just to not be done at like two o'clock. Yeah, two or one, yeah, you know. And um, and I got pretty high up and uh the uh hail started. And uh if anyone is listening has been to Angel Fire during hail, it can sometimes hail so much that it looks like snow on the ground. Right. Like it's it gets pretty heavy. And so I know that. And so as soon as I started seeing the hail, I'm like, oh, I better turn around and head down. And so I just beelined down, which would would have been a quick six minutes, right, you know, at the most. Right. And uh I was cooking and feeling good and feeling like I was killing it, and had a good weekend under my belt. And man, I passed some guys, thought I was hot stuff, and tried to pass a guy in the air on the wall, you know, and the wall was wet. And my tires didn't grab it at all. And I went up and straight down. And yeah, and I basically I jumped onto it, and you're supposed to deflect yourself off at an angle and then come back down, and I just slid straight down. So, you know, I could instead of riding across and using it, my my tires just slid straight to the ground and went shoulder, shoulder into the ground and broke my collarbone.
Host - Josh AndersonSo I'll tell you, like the guy that was riding so you passed someone and you effectively kind of jumped over them. Yes, yeah. What a great feeling that must have been for him. Because he was like, That asshole just jumped over me and then you then you follow him. Then I crash and break myself. Yeah. Yeah. He's probably telling that story more than you are.
Host - Dane HigginsYeah, it's pretty damn, pretty damn because yeah, because I got up and I'm like, I broke my collarbone. He's like, You want me to call somebody? And I'm like, no, and I got on my bike and rode down.
Host - Josh AndersonKudos for him for being cool and like trying to help you out.
Host - Dane HigginsYeah, I yeah, it trust me, it was like it was badass if I wouldn't have crashed. Like I it would have been like epically badass, but it was not badass with a hospital trip attached.
Host - Josh AndersonSo you you messed it up and then it took you, you you had surgery.
Host - Dane HigginsYeah, yeah. So I healed pretty quick. Yeah, and um it it wasn't it was a clean break, so it wasn't a fracture. Uh kind of broke right in the middle for the most part, and it kept setting itself in the place that it needed to be, so I didn't really have any soft, soft tissue or um you know, tendon problems or anything like that. So I was really lucky and I got some nice hardware, enough hardware to have a a Thai road bike if I didn't have to do this. Um and uh yeah, I I am you know I my body healed quick, you know. And I can't remember. I mean, I've already been to Whistler this year.
Host - Josh AndersonYou've been to Whistler, you've been to Sunrise at least once with us. Couple times. Couple times. And but but your riding is you you're riding slower and more timid now.
Host - Dane HigginsYeah, yeah. I'm riding way more careful than I normally do. I didn't race this season. I haven't raced in a while, but we had a a downhill season at sunrise, so four hours away, and I just decided not to do it.
Host - Josh AndersonMuch to the chagrin of some of your buddies.
Host - Dane HigginsYes, yeah. And uh I'm just not riding at the level that I want, you know, and and racing always gets in my head and puts me, put makes me push myself.
Host - Josh AndersonUh I'll never um we haven't told you this, uh huh, but I'll tell you now on air so everyone can hear the story at one time. Okay, but Lacey went shortly after you healed up with you to bugs. Yes, and you crashed twice on that ride, probably, yeah. You never crash on that trail.
Host - Dane HigginsNo, uh-uh.
Host - Josh AndersonAnd so Lacey came on, she's like, something's wrong with Dane.
Host - Dane HigginsYeah, yeah.
Host - Josh AndersonShe's like, he's not himself. No, like he crashed twice today. Yeah, and then you also crashed at 50, um, coming off a drop, uh, upper 50.
Host - Dane HigginsYeah, that was before I thought it was after. Uh, it may have been after. I I can't remember. It's all blending because until you just said it, I didn't realize my shoulder was a year ago. It's crazy, uh because it's still in my head, right?
Host - Josh AndersonYou know, and that's that's why this episode's so interesting.
Host - Dane HigginsYeah, and so that's so that's where this episode is, as we're talking about that. So it's not just the physical, um it's the mental. It's the mental.
Crash Stats And What They Mean
Host - Josh AndersonWell, as as we were uh as I was kind of just poking around a little bit on this topic, I ran into some interesting things. One was a a study done by the uh National Uh Library of Medicine, and uh they actually reviewed five hundred and thirty-four video mountain bike crashes or or videos of of mountain bike crashes.
Host - Dane HigginsWatching fail Friday.
Host - Josh AndersonI honestly think that's probably what they analyzed.
Host - Dane HigginsYeah, yeah.
Host - Josh AndersonBecause because that's a great source of tons of crashes. Yeah. So they they did a uh analysis on that, and they had uh they cataloged all the crashes, and so there's some some really interesting like metrics that came out of that that I thought would be cool to share with our listeners. Let's hear them. Uh so first was fifty-five percent of the crashes were over the bars.
Host - Dane HigginsOkay.
Host - Josh AndersonOTB. OTB. So you're going over the front instead of out the side or out the back.
Host - Dane HigginsYeah.
Host - Josh AndersonUm 53% of them were on moderate descents. I I question how well they really knew that because the video always never shows how steep something really is. Yeah. So I'm sure it's so they're on descents. Yeah. 53%. 64% of the crashes Wait, wait.
Host - Dane HigginsI just it just occurred to me. So how many percent 55% OTB. Yeah. 53% on descent. So does that mean 47% of people crash going uphill?
Host - Josh AndersonOr or flat or not I think it's I think it's probably I think it's probably not that steep. Yeah. Like like chill downhill. Have you ever crashed going uphill? I have.
Host - Dane HigginsI have too. Technical climbing. Uh yeah, mine was sprinting up a hill, and I got too far over the front, and just the smallest thing stopped my front wheel, and I flipped right over the bar.
Host - Josh AndersonYou went over the bars uphill climbing, not on a not on a technical climb. Yep, uphill. No, I've never done that. Yeah, actually, I've never seen that. I didn't even know that was possible. It is. It's yeah, I've done it a long time ago, but I did it. So 53% on design, 64% were due to poor jump landings.
Host - Dane HigginsOkay.
Host - Josh AndersonAnd 75% were at speeds of 18.6 miles per hour or 30 kilometers per hour or faster.
Host - Dane HigginsHow many people you think listening to this right now are picturing all of these? Like I can as soon as you said poor jump landings, I pictured like three different ones that I've seen on like a fail Friday, you know, yeah, where they just land nose in and like nose wheelie for a while and then go over, you know.
Host - Josh AndersonSo total confirmation bias for me, because I'm I'm a timid rider. Yeah, I don't ride super fast. I would say that my skills um are above my my risk tolerance.
Host - Dane HigginsOkay.
Host - Josh AndersonSo I can handle more than I'm doing. Yeah. Which you've got you've told me that too. Like you can do that.
Host - Dane HigginsNo ass, let's go. Yeah.
Host - Josh AndersonI ride slower than I could, and I never ever jump.
Host - Dane HigginsOkay.
Host - Josh AndersonAnd this data tells me if you want to avoid or reduce the the percentage of chance that you're gonna actually crash.
Host - Dane HigginsKeep doing what you're doing.
Host - Josh AndersonDon't jump and don't ride fast. So just slow down a little bit and just reduce your jumps a little bit, and you will reduce the amount of time you can crash based on this analysis. I um I actually crashed in the parking lot of a supermarket.
Host - Dane HigginsOh, for fuck's sake, Dane. Yeah. I more recent, I don't know if I mentioned on the podcast before, but I was testing a bike up at Pivot, and I just got on it in their parking lot, and I crashed.
Host - Josh AndersonYou crashed like a test bike at the pivot headquarters?
Host - Dane HigginsRight in front of the pivot people.
Host - Josh AndersonOh, perfect.
Host - Dane HigginsMaking made me feel great. Did you jack up the bike? Uh no. No, the bike was fine. I was fine, but it was embarrassing. My my pants got caught on the saddle.
Host - Josh AndersonOh.
Host - Dane HigginsAnd so I went to get off and my pants got caught, and then I just fell over. Um, but yeah, yeah, I've crashed in a parking lot. So I don't know, I don't know if going slower helps.
Host - Josh AndersonSo all right.
Rehab Basics PT And Healing
Host - Josh AndersonSo um, you know, there's kind of a couple like aspects to getting back on the bike. I think I think maybe the the the most obvious one, maybe we should start. It's a little bit out of order here, so I'm gonna screw us up here, but I feel like this order is better. The first one is the physical aspect. Yeah. So um you obviously gotta get yourself to a place where you're strong enough, comfortable enough, not broken enough to go ride.
Host - Dane HigginsYeah, right.
Host - Josh AndersonAnd and so, like, I would ask you, because I'm a big proponent of physical therapy, did you do any PT?
Host - Dane HigginsUh not for my collarbone. Uh it was pretty straightforward. And collarbones, notoriously, if you're not hurting your ligaments or your rotator or something like that, are pretty like they'll get back on the bike real quick. Um but when I broke my leg uh in half, uh, I definitely had PT quite a bit. And I was off the my my leg for so long. I recovered, I feel like it was maybe I want to say that was probably two to three months, and I was at a bike park and I remember going to Angel Fire and I wouldn't do the drops. Uh so that trip I rode but I didn't do the drops because I just didn't want that heavy impact on my leg. Uh, but I was back up and running pretty quick on that one. So and mentally not as timid as this one. And that's the interesting thing for me, trying to figure the difference out between breaking my leg in half in a race and then breaking collarbone and breaking my collarbone. Why is one affecting me more than the other? Have you had well first of all, you were you're a lot older now. It's not that I mean, it's six years. So 2020 versus 2025.
Host - Josh AndersonJesus, you broke your leg in 2020?
Host - Dane HigginsYeah. Wow, okay.
Host - Josh AndersonYeah. So But you are like an old man now. And you were super old. Like so old. How many injuries?
Host - Dane HigginsLike what what are the major injuries you've had over your biking? I think we counted nine broken bones, which I don't think's that many. But I feel like those have all happened.
Host - Josh AndersonFor the record, like it pretty much is a lot.
Host - Dane HigginsThat's a lot. Not considering what I've done. Here's the crazy part. I raced at the national level at downhill and never hurt myself with no insurance, which I don't suggest anyone do. But I was young and didn't have insurance, and I was stupid racing all over the country. Right. Never, never hurt myself. And now that I have insurance, I keep hurting myself. So I don't know, maybe I should get rid of my insurance.
Host - Josh AndersonI've had three major incidents. One of them last eight lasted eight years.
Host - Dane HigginsHoly crap. That's a long, yeah, long time.
Host - Josh AndersonYeah, and I'll tell you how we oh ultimate.
Host - Dane HigginsSo I uh is that when you lost your penis?
Host - Josh AndersonNo. All right, was that a different time? Just for the record, I still have my penis. It's alive and well, working, functioning perfectly. No problems. I'm not even having to use any pills or anything. Everything's good. Okay. That song Detachable Penis just goes into my head. Yeah, that's perfect. Thank you for that. Yeah, sorry. Thank you for that. It wasn't far the injury, it wasn't far from there. It wasn't that yeah. Is this the spider? No, no, no, that's just that's not this. Well, so that's I guess that's another one. But like I broke it two of the two of the injuries that took me out weren't
When A Crash Changes Your Life
Host - Josh Andersoneven on the bike. Yeah. Uh I broke a scaphoid um at Arapaho basin on a snowboard in the in the current terrain park trying to do shit on a snowboard. I have no business trying to do.
Host - Dane HigginsWhat's a scaphoid?
Host - Josh AndersonIs that it's like uh at your wrist here is a little bone like right there. Oh, okay.
Host - Dane HigginsI was thinking it was something that you get up on to paint up high on a wall. Like a scaffolding.
Host - Josh AndersonYeah, I think it's pretty common when you put your hand down to catch yourself to either break your collarbone, but a lot of people also break their scaffold. Yeah. So now I snowboard with gloves that have uh wrist guards built into them. You can't tell, they just look like normal gloves.
Host - Dane HigginsI have them too.
Host - Josh AndersonThey have uh like like um hard things inside, and then I just wrap the thing around the outside, and they're great. Uh love those gloves. Um, I also separated my shoulder like lifting weights, like doing overhead presses. Cool. That took me so so the scaphoid took me out for a couple months, ended up missing a 24-hour race. That's when I was doing a lot of those endurance races. Um, the shoulder took me out for like six months, but the really bad one I had, we were doing an urban ride down at U of A.
Host - Dane HigginsYeah.
Host - Josh AndersonAnd and helped me out, you can help me with the mechanics of the bike. So there used to be rapid rise derailures, yes, which went the opposite way. The spring goes the other way. Yeah. So I was um on flat ground, okay, stood up to start sprinting, took two pedal strokes, and my derailure cable broke.
Host - Dane HigginsOkay.
Host - Josh AndersonAnd the tension on the pedal it was like the you know, I had it like all the way hard.
Host - Dane HigginsSo the a rapid rise would send it up to the easiest cog.
Host - Josh AndersonSo I lost all the tension in the pedal. Gotcha. And the handlebars turned. Holy shit, who built this bike? It was Trek. It was the Trek fuel. And the handlebars at a super high speed went right, I went over the bars and in and it impaled myself in the stomach with the bars.
Host - Dane HigginsOh, without bar ends on. Did you core sample?
Host - Josh AndersonI didn't core sample. I had I had you know grips on or whatever, so I didn't I didn't core sample.
Host - Dane HigginsDid it break the skin? Did it go through?
Host - Josh AndersonI had a massive bruise, but it didn't break the skin. Okay. But it did injure my intestines. Holy crap, dude. And for eight years, we went through test after test after test after test after test trying to figure out what it was. Um, and I would throw up on every ride. Holy crap. I would start out, I'd get like a half mile in, I'd be like, uh throw up because my stomach was so upset. My stomach was distended, it was awful. I ended up having a partial colectomy. They cut part of my colon out and put it all back together, and now I'm fine. Holy crap, dude.
Host - Dane HigginsWow. You have the weirdest shit.
Host - Josh AndersonEight years of my eight years of my riding career was uh like throwing up every river. Throwing up every ride. Not not every ride, but like most rides. God, I'm surprised you're still riding after that.
Host - Dane HigginsThat's that's that's that's dedication. That's that's like classical training. Like if every time you get on a bike you throw up, like that would train you not to like biking. So I'm surprised you don't still do it.
Host - Josh AndersonYeah. So um, okay, but I haven't had I did fall off a small ledge out at Colossal Cave.
Host - Dane HigginsOkay.
Host - Josh AndersonUm, I didn't get hurt, I got scraped up and all that kind of stuff, but it definitely spooked me. And so when we get into the mental part, yeah, um, we can talk about that because it took me a while to get my mojo back. Um but uh I I think huge advocate of like you know, getting medical attention, following the advice of your doctors, following through with physical uh therapy. I think it makes a huge difference. I honestly think for your broken collarbone, you should have gone and got PT as well because your muscles atrophy. Yeah, and you could have built it back up and helped you be stronger faster. I don't know what do you think.
Host - Dane HigginsWell, so with my leg, uh I had an e-bike and I definitely needed that e-bike to get back on the bike and start uh because it had definitely I I was on the couch for over a month, you know, and then I had was in a boot for quite a while, a little knee scooter. I was gonna ask you if you use a knee scooter around the shop. Yeah, I had a Chris King headset in it. Of course. Yeah, ESI grips. It was awesome.
Host - Josh AndersonDid you have uh i-9 hubs on it?
Host - Dane HigginsNo, no, unfortunately it was not that nice. Um, but then uh yeah, so uh the e-bike was really instrumental because I could set the power. Uh at first I had it at full power just because my leg just didn't want to work. Yep. And then I could build up pretty quickly to getting back to having leg strength in both legs. Uh so that was really instrumental. The collarbone, like I said, it happened so quick and I recovered pretty quick. Um, my rotator cuff is the other one. I had a torn rotator cuff. I was practicing downhill and here in Tucson, and I went down a trail and I same thing, I I went around a corner leaning. The front wheel was I was pushing off of a rock to make the corner, and that rock rolled. So my front wheel just swoop swoop swipe. Swoop? Swept. Swept swept. There we go. Swept. That was way hard.
Host - Josh AndersonYou were like stuck in a loop there for a second. Wait, your face is drooping, bro.
Host - Dane HigginsSo anyway, my my uh wheel swept out from under me and my shoulder again went straight into the ground and I hit a rock with it. And uh I think at that impact, uh we were probably nine miles out, and so I needed to go nine more miles. That impact I think cracked my um upper, what do you call is this uh upper your upper muscle bone?
Host - Josh AndersonThe bone in the upper part of your arm.
Host - Dane HigginsYou got your ulna and your radius, and what's your upper one? Your it's not a femur, that's your leg. I don't know. Anyway, the upper bone, your body between your elbow and your bowl. Your biceps bone, whatever that bone is. Between your elbow and your shoulder. Not a not a physician. Um so anyway, uh cracked it like down. Uh fracture, fractured, down, uh, so like split it. It was like splitting it from the top down, like you would split a log. And then um didn't know it. I knew it was hurt, but I didn't know it, and then started to ride down the hill because it was getting dark, yeah, and I had to get out nine miles, and this trail was so rudded that I remember it pulled me to one side and yanked my shoulder, and that's when I think I tore my rotator. And then I ended up walking out. We walked out at nine o'clock at night.
Host - Josh AndersonSo you had a torn rotator and a rotator.
Host - Dane HigginsI think, and this is just a theory, but because of just me knowing how much pain I was in before and then after, I'm pretty sure if I would have just walked and not been a dumbass, you wouldn't have the torn rotator. I wouldn't have had the torn rotator. And the torn rotator took me over six months. Jesus. Uh, and that one needed lots of therapy. That one, you no joke, like just getting my range of motion, being able to sleep on that side, yeah, uh, and and put my arm above my head took years. So so some of these injuries can take you a long, long
Pain Meds Adrenaline And Sleep
Host - Dane Higginstime.
Host - Josh AndersonDid you use what what did you use for pain management? Do you do you take all the narcotic shit?
Host - Dane HigginsNo, I'm not into it at all. If I take ibuprofen, then I gotta really be hurting. So I it's so funny, man. I would I would have bottles of Percocet and Micodin and stuff sitting around that just they'll expire because I just don't take them. I do have this weird weirdness about me. Pain doesn't affect me the same way. Uh like if I touch, if I just put my finger on my wife, sometimes she acts like I am just like drilling a hole into her. She's super sensitive, you know. And then don't take that to the wrong place. I'm sorry, don't do that to my wife. This is a real thing. Sorry, just stop it. Let's come back. Let's come back. Calm down. Let's bring it down. Calm down. Anyway, there's some people that are really, really like sensitive to pain. I'm not. And I I will get done with a ride and I'll be bleeding for my legs because I hit like a cat claw, you know, like bush. Uh-huh. Right now I'm bleeding because I scratched one of your bones. Yeah. Um, and I don't feel it. When I broke my leg in half, I was just the happiest, cheeriest guy. Like there's pictures of me just laughing and joking in the hospital in the in the ambulance getting taken out. They had to take me on a stretcher. Uh, six people had to stretcher me out of that race because I was in a canyon, you know.
Host - Josh AndersonRight.
Host - Dane HigginsAnd I am cracking jokes while they're trying not to like drop me down the canyon, you know. And and I wasn't on any drugs, you know, it was adrenaline and just I just don't have the same pain receptors, you know, which which becomes a bad thing because I don't always know I'm in pain.
Host - Josh AndersonSo well, I I uh you know, when I was in the military, I was trained how to deal with it. Yeah, deal with pain out. Suck it up. Yeah, I'll just I won't go into details there, get myself in trouble. But um, but I'd feel it for sure. Yeah. And like after my stomach, and I was when I was recuperating, um I think it was about day two. No, it's like day three, and I didn't have any pain, but I had this feeling like it's time to take my medicine. Yeah, like go take your medicine, Josh. And I'm like, wait a minute, I don't have any pain.
Host - Dane HigginsOh, yeah, yeah.
Host - Josh AndersonAnd I'm like, holy shit, I've only been taking this a couple days, and I'm already feeling like the withdrawal or like the like the the addiction. Addiction, yeah. So I just took that bottle and dumped it right into the toilet, flushed it, and like I'm done. I'm doing this with ibuprofen from here on out.
Host - Dane HigginsYeah, I mean, even ibuprofen I won't take unless I have to, really have to.
Host - Josh AndersonYeah, we we called that vitamin M in the military, Motrin. Yeah. And like we take it, we took it all the time. I I take it a couple times a year if I have something. I I wouldn't shy away from it.
Host - Dane HigginsIt doesn't scare me, but whatever it takes. I mean, I know uh when after I broke my collarbone, I remember being at the cabin and everybody going through their their to see what we had. To see what they had, and I think somebody had Viking in their percocet with them.
Host - Josh AndersonYou don't remember what you guys did? I don't even remember. So you guys went for a drive.
Host - Dane HigginsWent for a drive.
Host - Josh AndersonAnd you went to a special store. No, no. Yes, you did. Yes, you absolutely did. In Angel Fire after my Yes.
Host - Dane HigginsWow, I don't remember that at all. Really? Oh shit, I do. I do. Okay, I do remember that. Okay, yes, I do. Wow. I blocked that shit out. So wow. Yes, and that's how I slept. Yes. So yes.
Host - Josh AndersonBecause you're like, I gotta get something to sleep.
Host - Dane HigginsYes, yeah.
Host - Josh AndersonAnd you guys left. I said, I can't go with you.
Host - Dane HigginsI I thought, yeah, and I needed it for the drive home. Yeah. So yeah.
Host - Josh AndersonYou weren't driving.
Host - Dane HigginsNo, I I needed to be able to just not be miserable.
Host - Josh AndersonAnd the funny thing is, is we had another guy with us there who was we had we had three broken people that we had we had we had Babyfoot who was there from a previous accident.
Host - Dane HigginsHe was there just in spirit because he had broken his collarbone like a month earlier.
Host - Josh AndersonLike he did the shuttle when we rode the Windsor Trail. By the way, if you if you do go to Angel Fire and you're coming from the south and you go through Santa Fe, or if you're in the Santa Fe area, yeah, like go ride the Windsor, W-I-N-S-O-R. Yeah, go ride the Windsor Trail. It's a shuttle ride trail. Yeah. Fantastic.
Host - Dane HigginsAwesome. And then, yeah, and then um DJ broke, or he didn't break his, he just strained his rotator or something. Something a tendon, but he was in a sling.
Host - Josh AndersonHis crash was violent, yeah, but happened like at the bottom. Yeah. Just on the just like right at the bottom of the lift.
Host - Dane HigginsOh, really?
Host - Josh AndersonYeah, he was just hauling ass and just wadded it up. Just skidded out. Yeah, he just lost traction and went down.
Host - Dane HigginsSo yeah, there's three of us. Three, three bro out of like what, seven? Uh we had two full cabins, so I think it was ten. Ten, okay.
Host - Josh AndersonSo thirty percent crack thirty percent broken rate on that trip.
Host - Dane HigginsThat was a pretty I didn't I didn't think about it that way. So so uh, you know, you you break yourself, um, you physically have to get better, whether that is like surgery, which I've had a few times, uh, the um the uh physical therapy afterwards, yeah, then the building back up. You have to build your muscles, your muscles back up to the level. I think the pro riders are just amazing at this, how fast they get back to a pro level, you know. And then uh, you know, the mental aspect. I would say the mental is probably my my hardest.
Host - Josh AndersonSo um one more thing on the physical thing. My buddy does the BCP 157 warrior stack, which is a peptide injection.
Host - Dane HigginsOkay.
Host - Josh AndersonTo so he plays soccer, he rides with us, he crashes. I think he's riding, he's been crashing a lot lately. Like every time I ride with him, he crashes. So I think he's like riding ahead of his skills a little bit. So I gotta like tell him to like dial about that.
Host - Dane HigginsLike maybe his fitness level is his fitness level's good, outdoing his bike handling skills. That's exactly right.
Host - Josh AndersonHe's he's a relatively new, he was a roadie convert. Um, so he's crashing a lot, but he's been doing the warrior stack and just just um just raving about how quickly it heals stuff for him. But I have seen some stuff recently, and and I guess if our listeners have any perspective or any real knowledge here, we'd love you to to comment and let us know. But like um, I guess this stack works, and one of the things it does is help build capillaries faster and get more blood to the area, and that's why it heals so fast. But it can actually do that with cancer as well. If you have cancer, it can like accelerate the cancer.
Host - Dane HigginsYeah.
Host - Josh AndersonSo I'm a little nervous, I've never tried it. Um, yeah, yeah. I guess if our listeners are using it and you guys have good experience, and if you're got you know medical uh education, you know about it medically, let us know what you think about that BCP 157.
Host - Dane HigginsYeah, and I would say just a good advice is listen to your doctor, you know.
Host - Josh AndersonYeah, listen to your doctor.
Host - Dane HigginsProbably the way to go. If you want to take it past that, just be careful.
Host - Josh AndersonDo you know who my doctor is?
Host - Dane HigginsI don't know, dude.
Host - Josh AndersonHe's also my best friend.
Host - Dane HigginsOh, oh. Then I do know who he is. Yeah, oh my God.
Kinesiophobia Fear Makes You Hesitate
Host - Josh AndersonDo you know okay? So we're gonna get into the mental side. Do you know there's a there's a word for this? For for fear of injury. FOMO? No. No, that's where we're missing out. It's kinesiophobia. Kinesiophobia.
Host - Dane HigginsOkay, and that's so that's where my brain is right now.
Host - Josh AndersonKineseophobia. You are you had this fear, yeah, and so it's it's causing and it's interesting, like when I do crash, more times than not, it's when I don't commit to the when I don't commit to the feature. Yeah, right, because I'm I'm scared.
Host - Dane HigginsYeah.
Host - Josh AndersonSo it's like that fear causes me not to commit, which then causes me to crash more often.
Host - Dane HigginsYeah. So so um my dilemma, you know, being coming back faster after my leg than with this wall ride. And I was uh, you know, I think with the leg, I I feel I have a very good beat of what happened and how it happened. In fact, afterwards, so on that basically I was following a pro down. He was showing me a faster line.
Host - Josh AndersonYeah.
Host - Dane HigginsI got he showed me a very fast line and I went through a section and I doubled it and went through this section much faster than I had been in practice. Because you doubled it. Because yeah, his line had me doubling a section instead of just sucking up this this mogul kind of a mogul area. Yeah. And as I came around a corner, I since I was going faster, I couldn't set up for the line I had always practiced. I got set up uh the as you come around this corner, it's kind of open almost like a double track, but they're ruts. And so they're two different distinct rights, uh, one on the left, one on the right, and there was this rock knoll in the middle of them. And so, and normally I would go to the left, right, and I would basically go around and then set up inside to take the next left. Um, and it was slower. Uh, I knew that, but it was clean. And this mogul uh double that I did had me set up to the right instead of the left. Instead of the left, and my pedal caught that knoll. Oh no. And basically it's almost immediately stopped the bike while I went forward and my gut hits the bars. Are you clipped in now? Are you? No, no, I'm a flat guy. And uh my leg basically slipped off the right pedal, went down into the rut underneath the bike. The bike's kind of stopped at this point, and now the rut is deep, and so the rut comes up about uh upper calf high.
Host - Josh AndersonRight, right.
Host - Dane HigginsAnd um And you and your body's still moving. No, no, no. Um my body had kind of stopped because the bike stopped me. I mean, it was really abrupt. And but then I fell over and the bike was pinning my leg against the uh rut. You've lost our listeners, I think. I know. And so basically it literally folded my leg in half, uh sideways. Uh not not front to back, but sideways.
Host - Josh AndersonAnd and this was your femur?
Host - Dane HigginsUh yeah, Tibfib. Tibfib. Yeah. And femur, not not my femur, thank god, because those are worse. Yeah. Uh Tibfib. They called it a spiral, like uh parachuters. I guess parachuters when they land. Get that a lot. Get it a lot. And uh it was real high on the t on the fibia and really low on the tibia.
Host - Josh AndersonOh, interesting, because they're not connected.
Host - Dane HigginsYeah.
Host - Josh AndersonOkay.
Host - Dane HigginsAnd so um that that series of events I've analyzed. I can go look at that rock. I have pictures of that rock, I have video of that rock. Um I knew exactly what happened, you know, and it was a mistake I made. I picked a wrong line. Yeah, and for probably a good year, I had a real problem with any kind of trail where my pedals got near rocks. So I did have a lot of mental issues there. So if the trail was wide open, if I was at at a a bike park where I was just doing jumps and stuff like that, it wasn't an issue. But if I got into a rocky section where my pedal could clip a rock and have the same thing happen, it did freak me out. Um that wall ride, I think, messes with me because I still a hundred percent don't know. Like I did in my brain everything right. I I wasn't making a mistake, I didn't hit that jump to hit the wall wrong. I I wasn't going any higher than I normally did. I wasn't doing anything wrong. Like physically, I did everything I did all weekend and I slammed to the ground. And I that somehow has messed my brain up because my brain is now going, you can do everything right and still break your collarbone. And I think that's what I'm trying to figure out.
Host - Josh AndersonSo I would say that there's probably something in the fact that you are X number of decades old. Um brittle, super brittle. You shouldn't be doing wall rides. Yeah, I mean, there could be that. Super brittle, especially not in a hill storm, over top of someone at a high speed. I think at night.
Host - Dane HigginsYeah, I I gotta get in it in my head that the it was the traction. So, and then, you know, this mental game, you know, dealing with the mental, trying to overcome your demons, you know, those are the hardest things. So a lot of people will tell you, just get back on the bike, just go do it and and build your confidence, which is what I've been doing. But man, I you know, in our whistler episode, I just noted how as soon as I saw that wood, I was like, uh, I just clenched. I it's it's amazing. I did it's it's amazing. I just wait. Yeah.
Host - Josh AndersonAs soon as you saw the wood, you clenched.
Host - Dane HigginsYes. I'm just yes. You use that however you want.
Host - Josh AndersonI'm gonna take that clip and use it. Just put it in our property. As soon as I saw that wood, I clenched.
Host - Dane HigginsOh man. Uh so dirty. Um, but yeah, I I you know, so so that's the mental aspect. So you got the physical. Okay. So if we get back online, because we've been talking about this, and we haven't really kind of dived into our outline. So really we've talked about mental.
Host - Josh AndersonWe talked about the physical. Physical. Yeah, you gotta get yourself back on. We talked about kinesiophobia. Yep. It says, hey, a fear of injury.
Confidence Rebuild Plans That Work
Host - Dane HigginsI think you know, what what do you think is so so the first ride back, you know, like one of the things that I did was I started to just somebody gave me really good advice, and I don't remember who it was, if it was you or I couldn't tell you who it was.
Host - Josh AndersonProbably wasn't me.
Host - Dane HigginsBut it was good advice. I think it may have been Justin, I'm not sure. Um, but I was explaining that I'm having this problem, and they told me to start riding trails that I don't normally ride. And it kind of clicked really well with me. Like basically, don't go. What one of the problems that I was having is I would go back to a trail I'm used to, and I wouldn't do what you used to I couldn't do what I used to do, I would be frustrated, it would weigh on my mind, you know, obstacles that I had to walk because my mind wasn't set, yeah, where all of a sudden it was creating frustration and angry.
Host - Josh AndersonBecause you're like I've ridden this a hundred times.
Host - Dane HigginsWhy the hell am I walking this right now? And so I forgot who this person was.
Host - Josh AndersonThat wasn't me, but uh it's an interesting idea.
Host - Dane HigginsYeah, they said don't go ride a trailer you're used to, ride something different, because then if you walk a section, it's not you don't have a basis of your skill level or anything. And um, and that was really to me good advice. So I started riding more cross country, a little bit more um, you know, aerobic, less so you say more cross country, right?
Host - Josh AndersonSo like that was where my head was at. Yeah. What I've done when I've been coming back is like like kind of dial down the technical nature of the trails I'm riding. Yeah. Start slow. Yeah, choose like you have in your notes here, choose an easier trail to start with.
Host - Dane HigginsYes, exactly.
Host - Josh AndersonAnd then uh I don't know. I was riding last night in our we have uh uh our Tuesday night ride, and we had a new guy with us last night who's been off the bike for a long time. And he comes out with a specialized enduro that he just picked up, he used one, and he was dog and up the hills like so slow. But then on the downhill, he was just lightning. Yeah, and you could tell that he had grown up doing Moto, he grew up uh racing BMX, you could tell he just had those skills, like he was just so fast around the corners and everything. It was amazing watching him. And like I'm struggling to keep up with him on the downhill, and I just kept saying to my head, like slow is fast, slow is fast. Like I think I gotta get my turns faster, and I need to go out and just ride slow and just really focus on the technique and then dial up the speed, dial up the speed, dial up the speed, dial up the speed. And it feels like this would be the same approach I take if I got hurt again. Yeah, it's like slow is fast, like just get out there, pedal, get around the trail, yeah, take it easy, don't don't beat yourself up, you know, shorter ride to start and then build.
Host - Dane HigginsYeah.
Host - Josh AndersonRight?
Host - Dane HigginsYeah, uh one of the other things is uh session. So session is something that uh, you know, people will say, I'm sure everybody listening is like, oh yeah, I session.
Host - Josh AndersonBut I don't know that everyone knows that term. Okay, so so especially people that are not gravity riders. So like what is sessioning?
Host - Dane HigginsSo sessioning is where you get to a technical area that is difficult that you're not confident on, and maybe you walk and stopping and taking the time to go back and forth and either try and ride it, figure out the line, look at it, watch other riders, spend a little time. You know, sometimes we get in a hurry in our rides and we want to just do our loop or do our lap or do our run or whatever, and we don't stop and actually just session or ride to kind of look at the lines. In in downhill racing, we did this all the time. Where would you would ride your practice runs, but then you would switch who you rode behind and you would see what their run uh their lines were, and it would help you change your line choice. Otherwise, you just practice the same line, yeah. And so it'll help you kind of like fine-tune your speed and and knock off a few seconds or milliseconds or whatever it is. And uh, and so sessioning is part of that too. You'll watch some of the World Cup pro guys, they'll do a track walk, and a lot of what they're doing is just looking at the lines, which lines they can take, how they're gonna come into it. They'll they'll back up and kind of walk towards like a drop as if they're riding it, yeah, so they can see where they need to look when it may be a blind landing, you know. And so sessioning is something that I think I personally don't do enough. You know, I don't I don't stop and just kind of and and you and I did this when we did a ride not too long ago.
Host - Josh AndersonYou you're good at making me stop. Yeah because you're like, you know that there's something that I can ride. Yeah. And because you've seen me ride something similar, and then I I go to walk and you're like, uh uh. Yeah, get your ass back there, you're gonna ride this.
Host - Dane HigginsYeah, and and sometimes it just takes that doing it a couple times. Because when you come into it, you're more tired and you're less likely to want to take that time. But if you stop and take a second to catch your breath, especially if it's like an uphill technical, um, take your breath, kind of look at it, maybe watch a couple friends who can do it. Yeah, you know, uh, that's super helpful because you see where they go. And I will look at the rocks that they're hitting with their tires, and I will try and memorize which rocks their tires are going over so that when I come up, I'm looking at those because you're more likely to put your wheels where you're looking.
Host - Josh AndersonSo that technical section that you're talking about, basically every technical section out there now, yeah, I can clear I can clean it all.
Host - Dane HigginsYeah, yeah.
Host - Josh AndersonI can ride it all.
Host - Dane HigginsAnd and that that helps. So sessioning is one way that you can get over stuff.
Host - Josh AndersonSo I'm I mean, what about finally? So so you know, like um there's a there's an adage in gravity riding, uh, at least that like homegrown taught us uh at one of the clinics there, which was like pre-ride, ride, then free ride. So you ride it, you ride a trail three times.
Host - Dane HigginsYeah.
Host - Josh AndersonThe first time is a pre-ride, you're kind of checking things out, looking at the lines, getting a feel for the trail. You're going slow.
Host - Dane HigginsYeah.
Host - Josh AndersonYou you dial it up a little bit the next one, you ride it, yep, and then it's not till the third time down that you like open it up.
Host - Dane HigginsYep, yeah, and and they have that actually plastered at a lot of bike parks now. Oh, is that pre pre-ride, re-ride, and free ride. Okay, and uh, and so that's the same philosophy, and they'll that's become pretty common that I see at bike parks now, uh, because you never know what's coming. So, and and that's very true. So at Whistler, one of the things that I noticed was any of the blues. I knew there was nothing on that that I couldn't handle, and I would just open it up on the blues. When I got into the blacks, I knew there was probably one or two things that were gonna challenge me, but I could do them. I just needed to be cautious when I came into them. And then the double blacks were the ones that threw me because those were just multiple stuff and enough multiple stuff that sometimes it was just undoable. I just was not willing to try it, you know.
Host - Josh AndersonUh yeah, I know I get that feeling.
Host - Dane HigginsAnd and so um, so yeah, definitely being aware, not just bulldozing into stuff, you know. Yeah, um, I thought you were gonna say follow somebody.
Host - Josh AndersonAnd that's what was my next thing I was gonna bring up was following someone down.
Host - Dane HigginsI I would be careful with that because if you have a friend who's really a talented rider and you follow them, you Well, this has got to be a trusted thing where it's like, hey man, I need to just I just need to kind of cruise down this.
Host - Josh AndersonI want to follow your line. Yeah, can you just scrub your speed, make this a chill lap, and like go down slow and I'm gonna follow your line and just get myself to ease back into it.
Host - Dane HigginsYeah, yeah. I would say so. We used to do that a lot practicing racing. And there's been a couple times when I want off drops that I wouldn't have known, you know, or wouldn't have done. Because of your function. But I was just looking at somebody's back tire and then I was all of a sudden in the air. And I'm like, oh shit, you know.
Host - Josh AndersonAnd there's things you've done that following you.
Host - Dane HigginsYeah. And there's there's things that you have to do, you know, to make the bike, you know, basically line up and land correctly. And so um, or not dead sailor and a jump and stuff like that.
Host - Josh AndersonSo I would just say that's what's dead sailor for our listeners?
Host - Dane HigginsUh so uh so one of the things that I follow good riders into jumps to know what speed to hit them, you know. And if you're not prepared and you don't know the jumps coming up, you may stiffen up. And when you stiffen up and you you kind of lock your arms and and you just kind of go stiff while you're in the air, yeah, and you're at the will of whatever gravity is doing to you. If you're tilting uh when you came off that a little bit, you keep tilting. And so Dead Sailor is when you just kind of leave the lip of a jump and kind of just stiffen up and just let the bike, yeah.
Host - Josh AndersonYou're not actually and you're drifting into whatever you're not positioning the bike and you're not soaking up the the hit or anything like that.
Host - Dane HigginsAnd the way you get rid of that is style, little stees. Uh yeah. So you do a little style. So um you'll see like old in the olden days. So I use that out. Everybody take a drink. No, oh, I didn't say I said the olden days. You didn't say you didn't say back in the day. Yeah, you're right. Okay, so nobody can drink. Stop drinking.
Host - Josh AndersonUm, okay, so it's the funny thing is is if I publish this episode first, no one's gonna know what we're talking about.
Host - Dane HigginsI feel like that episode's already been, well, I don't know.
Host - Josh AndersonIt's not.
Host - Dane HigginsOh no, it's not. Okay, hasn't been published yet.
Host - Josh AndersonThe one where you said it all the time has been published.
Host - Dane HigginsWe should tell people that there's now a drinking game associated with it.
Host - Josh AndersonAnytime Dane says back in the day, you have to drink, you have to drink.
Host - Dane HigginsSo, and I'm trying not to, because I don't want a bunch of alcoholic listeners. Oh, here we go.
Host - Josh AndersonWe already have that.
Host - Dane HigginsSo, but anyway, when you go off a jump, in order to prevent a dead sailor, you do a little bit, like turn the bar a little bit, you you do whip something. Intentional movement, um, tilting the bike, turning your bar just a little, pull your knees up, little flare, pulling it up, pushing down, whatever you do, that helps break break that uh that dead sailor, and you have more control to kind of set the bike down at the angle you want and not be subject to the wind, you know, which is literally what can happen.
Host - Josh AndersonSo let's recap what we talked about. So we talked about the physical stuff. I strongly advocate, you know, going and following through with the physical therapy sessions and and building back up because it when you don't use muscles, they atrophy.
Host - Dane HigginsLet your body heal.
Host - Josh AndersonLet your body heal. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Get get your follow the guidance of your doctors, let your body heal, build your strength back up. Yeah. So then get back on the bike.
Host - Dane HigginsYep. Right? Start off with something easy.
Host - Josh AndersonStart off easy, start off slow.
Host - Dane HigginsUm maybe do some trails you're not used to.
Host - Josh AndersonTrails that you don't have a baseline to compare yourself so that you don't feel bad.
Host - Dane HigginsYep, yeah.
Host - Josh AndersonUm, we we talk about sessioning for sure.
Host - Dane HigginsYeah.
Host - Josh AndersonI think uh I I like the idea of following someone if it's a trusted partner. Yeah, like I know if I went and wear with you and I was like, Dane, I really want to work to go slow. I would watch out for you. You would do it for me. Yeah. Um, and then like there's another thing I thought like there's a social aspect to mountain
Ego Identity And Long-Term Riding
Host - Josh Andersonbiking. Uh-huh. And like yesterday with that new rider who came, he just wanted to ride on the back. And we've we've like got ourselves on this follow the leader thing where um we've got a group, it was like six guys, and you come up to anytime you come up to a trail intersection, the second guy back chooses which direction we go. Okay. And the first guy goes to the back. And you're constantly every single intersection, the second guy comes up. The second guy comes up, yeah, the first guy goes to the back, and we keep doing that. And the crazy thing is you have no idea where you're gonna ride. Okay, you don't know what the trail, what trail you're gonna ride.
Host - Dane HigginsOh, so this is how you break up the monotony that you ride the same thing. Right.
Host - Josh AndersonSo it's like, and then you look at their strawberry and like, where the fuck did those guys go? And like last night we had guys that don't know the trails at all. Yeah, and so they took us, one of the guys took us on this trail that like I haven't ridden in like 18 months because it's like a shit show. And I was like, damn, I haven't been on the shit show trail in a long time. Uh so it was it was it's fun because you never know what to expect. But um, so this guy who he was kind of struggling, he's just getting back into it. You know, there's like the social aspect of like he couldn't just fall two miles off the back. Yeah, because who was in the back was constantly changing throughout the ride. So not necessarily that perspective, but like if you go ride with a group and it's the people you trust, you're like, hey, I'm I'm easing back into it, you get the social thing that pulls you in and maybe can help break down some of your fear.
Host - Dane HigginsYeah, it can stop you from talking to yourself, talking to yourself, getting out of your fucking head. Yeah, yeah. So that helps a lot. And uh yeah, so so lots of ways to kind of start back into it. Um the ego trip is probably the biggest. The biggest barrier and the hardest thing to deal with, I think, is when you can't do what you used to be able to do. Yeah, and I'm I'm there, I'm right there. Uh I I don't think it's because I'm older, I think it's because I'm not riding like I used to. Um, but I don't do the same things, you know, the the injuries stack, you know, and so for me, I am not doing the same level of riding that I used to. Right. And uh I had this problem when I played golf. So same thing when I played golf. Uh I was a pretty good golfer, I was a two-handicap, um, played quite a bit for a long, long time.
Host - Josh AndersonYeah.
Host - Dane HigginsAnd then um, I was also mountain bike racing, and at some point I got out of golf and I had to choose. If am I gonna spend four hours golfing or four hours on a bike?
Host - Josh AndersonYeah, the right decision, by the way, is on a bike. Yeah. Just for anyone that's what I choose. If you if anyone didn't know that on this call, you're on this podcast.
Host - Dane HigginsGenuinely, my golfing friends, what I told them is I'll have to I'll have time to golf when I'm old.
Host - Josh AndersonYeah.
Host - Dane HigginsAnd uh right now I'm gonna ride my bike because I may not be able to ride my bike all the time.
Host - Josh AndersonBut you're old now and you haven't started golfing.
Host - Dane HigginsIt's true. Um but uh, you know, I have some family members that golf, and so they would come to visit me, and it'd be a couple years uh since I had golfed, and I'd go out and golf with them, and my brain was too handicapped. Too handicapped. And I I can't tell you how many times I pulled a muscle or hurt myself because my body wound up to hit the ball the way that I used to, because my brain told it it could, and it was not stretched, it was not practiced, it was not conditioned for that.
Host - Josh AndersonRight.
Host - Dane HigginsAnd I'm literally like ripping tendons, you know, uh, because I'm trying to to swing like I did when I when I used to play a lot. And so that's the other thing about injury that you have to remember is that you're gonna step back, you know, a little bit. You got to condition all that stuff, you gotta get all those things working again, but you're also not that too handicapped anymore, you know, and so you gotta work back to it. And that's hard.
Host - Josh AndersonI don't know, man. I mean, like my whole perspective and probably what's holding back my progression is like I have this mentality of like walk today, ride tomorrow.
Host - Dane HigginsYeah.
Host - Josh AndersonVersus ride today, crash, don't ride tomorrow. Okay. Right. So I'd rather walk than than get hurt. Okay. You know, and then I start looking at as a strategist, I start looking at this data, and it says, you know, 75% of the crashes are at speeds of 50, 18.6 miles an hour is not that fast.
Host - Dane HigginsYeah.
Host - Josh AndersonSo it's like, okay, I should ride slower. And they and I don't really jump. Yeah. And so a lot of like I don't know, maybe it's just the the wonder of the Friday fails thing, but like it seems like most of the bad crashes are when people are jumping.
Host - Dane HigginsYeah, I I would say one thing we should distinguish in this podcast to talk about is the difference between crashing and getting an injury. And so I have crashed really small crashes and broken a bone in my hand.
Host - Josh AndersonAnd you've had major crashes and not had anything happened.
Host - Dane HigginsNothing happened.
Host - Josh AndersonYeah, fair.
Host - Dane HigginsAnd so um, so it's really, you know, uh learning to fall, having good equipment. If you are worried about falling, maybe having some elbow and knee pads and little little gear on you.
Host - Josh AndersonI thought about like maybe going and taking some jujitsu classes or something that teach you how to fall.
Host - Dane HigginsI I yoga, like all I do yoga, all these all these things to make your muscles not tear.
Host - Josh AndersonYeah.
Host - Dane HigginsLike I I'm I'm believe it or not, my collarbone healed way faster. Than your doctor thought it was gonna. No, then like I uh pulled muscle on my back or something like that. And and you know, muscle and tendon is way worse. I have pulled, I've yanked, you know, I was racing in Duro at sunrise in in Arizona.
Host - Josh AndersonThis is when you yanked your gr your groin?
Host - Dane HigginsNo, no. Uh this is when I pull my thumb backwards. Oh yeah. And my thumb's still not right after that, and it's like yanked it backwards and kind of tore some ligaments and tendons. Took me off the bike for a few months. I didn't really, I that's it, you know. I just couldn't hold on to the bike anymore. Like literally, like my hand would just fall off. Um, so so there's little little things and big things, but crashing is not always a bad thing. Learning to crash is a good idea, you know. Yeah. And then if you do get like to be 150 like I am, and you're brittle, you definitely want to tone it down, you know, and have some protective gear on.
Host - Josh AndersonSo so my question for you then, because you're still in the middle of this kinesiology thing, right? You're yeah, you you're still in your head, you're not riding where you will.
Host - Dane HigginsYeah.
Host - Josh AndersonDo you think you'll just dial it back a little bit and set reset your baseline to something that's a little less than a little bit of a big thing?
Host - Dane HigginsYeah, I think that's easy. That's what's happening right now, and that's what I'm struggling with, the ego part.
Host - Josh AndersonYou're like Spider-Man when he went through the change and your eyes are turning on black. You haven't seen the new Spider-Man yet.
Host - Dane HigginsNo, I haven't. Yeah, sorry. Yeah. Now you spoil it for me. Sorry. So now he's gonna change. Um, but anyway, the the ego part is the hard part is that I don't, it's kind of my my who I am. You know, I identify as a you know a downhill racer.
Host - Josh AndersonYou say it, you say it in almost every podcast.
Host - Dane HigginsYeah.
Host - Josh AndersonAnd I have never known you when you downhill race, by the way. Uh yeah, you're right.
Host - Dane HigginsYou're right. Because we met after Yeah, yeah, you're right.
Host - Josh AndersonSo, like to me, as far as I'm concerned, you could be making it all up. Maybe no breaks was not even a real thing. I don't know.
Host - Dane HigginsIt existed. There's like four people that know about it. Um, so no, I you know, I you're right. So, and that's part of my identity. My my you know, my nickname is Downhill Dane and has been for a long, long time. And so it is part of who I am. So that's an ego thing. That's really hard to let go of. And if I let that control me too much on the trail, I'm gonna that those injuries are gonna keep happening. So I have to, I have to come to terms, you know, and so that's one of the the things about uh you know, coming back from an injury is you have to be able to dial that ego back and you have to be able to to kind of hit reset and be okay with not being the fastest guy, not hitting the biggest jump, not doing the biggest, you know, things.
Host - Josh AndersonDo you think you need to rebrand? Like if you if you're known as downhill dane, yeah, like and you're not downhill dane anymore. What if I'm a like flat trail dane? Oh, yeah, I was thinking Lycra Dane or something like that.
Host - Dane HigginsLike Rodane, no way.
Host - Josh AndersonBut no, no, honestly, like something equally as punk rock. Yeah. Like you could just change your email instead of downhill Dane to like guru, like the suspension guru Dane.
Host - Dane HigginsMore people now know me as guru.
Host - Josh AndersonYeah.
Host - Dane HigginsAnd so honestly, that has become kind of my nickname, you know.
Host - Josh AndersonSo why don't you just rebrand and strip all the downhill stuff out of your out of your moniker?
Host - Dane HigginsBecause letting go of your ego is hard. I know, you know, and it's like it's kind of a sadden thing, you know. Like if I go to top golf for a birthday party, I want to hit that drive 300 yards. Like, like I am, I am out for blood. I'm gonna make that, I'm gonna smash that ball into tiny little pull your back. Exactly. Exactly. But my you know, I I want because your ego like wants, I mean it feels good to be able to just hit that drive so hard that and and those things are computerized, so they tell everybody how far you hit it, you know, which is cool. Um, but yeah, you gotta let go of that.
Host - Josh AndersonSo we got a good 20, 30 years of riding left in us. 40, maybe 50, maybe depending on science. I mean 50 is we would be stretching it. Yeah. That would be but 20, 30 years realistically, to ride bikes. Like, I want to ride. Like, I don't really care if I'm hauling ass or taking giant drops or going over the most technical, crazy shit ever.
Host - Dane HigginsWell, I don't want to ride. So that and that's true. Uh everybody rides for different reasons. Yeah.
Heat Bonk And Choosing Your High
Host - Dane HigginsSo like um, if I so I did a big ride this weekend, and aside from almost dying, um Lacey saw what you did.
Host - Josh AndersonHe's like, she's like, what is he doing? And he tried it backwards. Yes, you're not supposed to do that.
Host - Dane HigginsI know, it was stupid. Tell tell a story what happened. Uh it's a long story, but real quick is uh I dropped my daughter off for a hike with her friend. I had two hours to burn, so I took my bike and was gonna do some laps on our on uh we're up on the mountain in the in the cool pines. Yeah, and um out of the 116 degree degree weather down here. And I went on a trail that I haven't done in a long, long time and had forgotten, easily forgotten, how hard it is. And I did it backwards, like she said. Yeah, just stupid, just mistake after mistake, got stuck out in the middle of nowhere, basically way away. Uh went into heat stroke, started shaking, had a hard time, uh, bonking. And I had to explain this to a friend of mine what bonking actually means. Because calories, yeah. Well, sometimes people hear the word bonk and you're like, oh, you were just tired. No. Uh bonking is a physical.
Host - Josh AndersonUm You actually you don't have you do not have calories to burn in your system.
Host - Dane HigginsYeah, your your your muscles don't work. Like you go to lift your leg and your body is like flips you the bird and says it's not gonna happen. And so I got to where I had to climb up 2,000 feet uh on this super rocky terrain, pushing a 50-pound bike um up to get out of it. And I genuinely thought you weren't gonna make it I wasn't gonna make it. Um I took brakes and and ended up making it, you know, because I was smart and because I was lucky, because it was a nice day, 75. Uh were you out of electrolytes as well, or just just had electrolytes? Okay.
Host - Josh AndersonSo you weren't like you didn't have like the muscle lock.
Host - Dane HigginsI didn't have cramping. Okay. I just literally the trail was up. Uh my legs just didn't want to I I could I could walk 10 feet and I'd be exhausted, and my heart rate went through the roof. Um, and so I'm at the point where I'm gonna ditch my bike in the woods because pushing it is so hard to do, and the trail is so unrideable and hike a bike like upstairs. Like imagine going up the Empire State building.
Host - Josh AndersonThat's what you were doing with your bike.
Host - Dane HigginsYeah, with your bike, with your you know a heavy ass bike. Heavy ass bike. And uh I I got out and I was I was thinking about it. We got down the mountain and we went to pizza, and I, you know, I'm thinking about this experience, and you know, was I really close to death? Well all of this stuff, was I just panicky, like what was going on? I I know I had those physical things going on. I've had a little heat exhaustion, so I knew I was at that, but I started to get uh what we call a runner's high, like that that endorphin kick in after you do a big big second wind, yeah. And I was thinking to myself, that feels good. Uh I'm I'm I'm glad I'm getting this feeling because I was miserable and I was worried, and I was really worried for my daughter who had no idea where I was.
Host - Josh AndersonNo signal of it.
Host - Dane HigginsComing back to the car and has no idea where I'm at. And um, and so in that experience, like I was like, oh, this runner's high is kind of a thing, you know, you can do that. I don't like it that much. I like adrenaline way better. When you're riding with adrenaline, like when you're going off of stuff and you get that adrenaline high, it's during. Uh, it's while you're doing it that you're getting this high. This is why when I crash, I don't have a lot of pain because I got so much adrenaline going. So it's hard to dial it back.
Host - Josh AndersonSo it's almost like an addiction.
Host - Dane HigginsUh totally. It is the one drug that I will fully admit that I'm totally addicted to. Yeah. So if they put it other than ketamine. Uh I don't know what ketamine is. Okay, I'm sure you don't. I don't know. I I know that somebody who somebody famous died at ketamine. It doesn't matter. Keep going. Matthew Perry. Yes. Yes, yeah. So um, yeah, so for me, the ego is the hard thing to get past, is wanting to show people what I'm capable of or what I used to be capable of, things like that. And so, you know, when you're dealing with an injury, you can you can re-injure yourself if you do that too much, you know. Yeah, and uh you can s slow down your healing if you do that too much. So you gotta be careful.
Host - Josh AndersonWell, Dane's gonna rebrand himself as the guru.
Host - Dane HigginsYeah, um, uphill Dane.
Host - Josh AndersonUphill Dane versus downhill
Listener Stories Questions And Closing
Host - Josh AndersonDane. Anything we missed in this is an interesting conversation. I think everybody deals with it. Yeah. You know, uh, we'd love to hear like y'all's perspective, you know, or stories. Or stories like what happened to you. Did you almost die on a mountain bike? How did you all yeah, how did you survive? And then uh were there any tricks or anything that you used to get back on?
Host - Dane HigginsYeah.
Host - Josh AndersonYou know, I think like starting out slow, easing back into it, yeah, but but for sure getting back on.
Host - Dane HigginsAnd the mental. The mental is the thing I'm struggling with. If anyone has any good mental techniques that help them, uh let us know because I'm still struggling with that. So visualize it.
Host - Josh AndersonAll right, buddy. You got any final thoughts for our listeners here?
Host - Dane HigginsThat's it, man. Don't get hurt.
Host - Josh AndersonDon't get hurt. Yeah, we appreciate you both.
