Crashed and Burnt

After a really slow start to the season I was hoping Eau Claire would be the turning point. This is a really good course and always draws some really strong riders. Cory and I pre-rode on Saturday and the course was awesome, I kept joking that I should just ride 6 laps Saturday and scrap the race...hindsight that would have been a good idea! Sunday we got to the race, it was really nice and everyone was saying the course was in great shape. I had a better start than I was expecting and was quickly sitting in the top 10 on the lead out. It was really dusty, but not THAT bad and then all of the sudden some guy come blasting up next to me and drills my handle bars. Everything happened in slow motion which was really sweet! As my bars spun around my tire blew off the rim and the rim dug into the gravel. I went over the bars and landed on my head HARD! I tumbled a couple times while thinking 'nobody is going to see me in all this dust and there are about 50 guys coming really fast'. About midway through that thought I took the first hit to the ribs. By the time the dust settled and everyone was gone Sam Oftedahl and myself were down and out pretty hard. I pulled myself and bike off the trail knowing the women weren't far behind us. On the way back to the car I assest the damage; seriously broken helmet (2 large dents and cracked in 6 places), gash on four head, bloody nose, gravel rash on both elbows, both shoulders, and entire right calf, and a pretty sizable gash on my left knee. The bike didn't fair to well either with 2 broken spokes, bent wheel, bent brake rotor, grips are ripped off, and the seat took a pretty hard beating.
After checking in with Cathy I headed to first aid and they got me all fixed up. I spent the rest of the day cleaning dirt and gravel out of my wounds while Cathy handed bottles and proceeded to get burnt. Needless to say neither of us slept at all last night!
I will get some pictures of the carnage up here soon.