Mike's Bike Blog

A couple months back while at the RunFar Time Trial  the Bike Noob asked me why I shaved my legs. I gave the standard roadie reasons about it being easier to clean up after a ride, this is especially so when I ride during lunch in wet weather. I can wipe down and not have dirt and grit encrusted in my leg hair. Getting compression socks on and off is a little easier, no hair pulling. And until recently my best answer was because it's tradition.

That is until recently, a couple months ago while shaving for a race I noticed a lump in my leg. I wasn't too worried about it but would bring it up at my yearly physical with my family Doctor. That appointment was last week, he ordered up an ultrasound of my legs to see what it was.

The ultrasound went down this Friday morning and I'm happy to say that "it's not a tumor", say it again but with a Schwarzenegger accent "it's not a tumor". It turned out to be a blood clot. It wasn't a fresh clot however, it's been in my leg for a little while, not sure if they'll be able to determine how long I've had it. At first my Doctor wasn't too worried about it, he told me to set up an appointment with my Hematologist next week and he ordered a prescription of blood thinners. At this point I was still set to race the next day in the Tour of Austin.

Of course Jennifer wanted to be sure that I was cleared to race, the Doc and me didn't talk whether or not I could race or should be racing so Jennifer wanted the peace of mind knowing that I wouldn't combust out on the road. His Friday office hours ended at 2 so by 2:10 when I called he was gone. Around 4 after much deliberation I called the after hours line and got ahold of him. We talked a bit about it and he said it would be best that I didn't go at race pace, he didn't have a problem with me riding just not at  a threshold heart rate for at least 48 hours while the blood thinners kick in.

I was quite bummed that I wasn't going to race, I had high hopes for it. At least a pack finish anyway. I think the course suited me quite well and I like riding out in the Manda area and have ridden and raced out there before. I was contemplating going out to the race anyway and riding it but taking it easy. That way I would still get credit for the race in my pursuit to upgrading to cat 4. A couple things would happen if I did that, more than likely I would not be able to hold back and would go to hard. The second possibility would be that I would get in the way. In the end I just moped around the house in compression socks.

This week I'll get in to see my Hematologist and see what is going on. I've waited the 48 hours and I've been on a couple harder effort rides, not all out race pace, but enough to not be consider recovery or easy rides.

So without shaving my legs I would have probably never noticed the lump that led to further investigation. Who knows what it could have led to. Now I have a new reason to shave my legs and best of all I've won over Jennifer and she does not have a problem with the shaving tradition any more.