I'm home. It's good to be home. Camp is awesome, but after 8 hard days it's good to be home.

I'll start with the worst part of camp. Friday on our way back to the hotel, we're flying down the shoulder of a moderately busy single lane highway. We have a tailwind and a very slight decline and the guys at the front pump it up to 31 mph. We're in a tight double paceline, and it feels great. My HR isn't even 130. I'm riding mid-pack behind Brian M. And then Brian S, riding next to Brian M. on the inside, hits a nasty little sinkhole hard. He recovers, or seems to, but it must have damaged his rear wheel, because he's starting to fishtail. Back and forth, farther and farther and I know he's going to crash. And he does, spinning sideways. He slams into Brian M. and their bikes go careening. It's like watching footage of crashes in pro races. Or Wide World of Sports. And I expect that I'll go down too. But somehow, as I hear the shouts and cries of men hitting pavement behind me, a path opens in front of me and I get through. So do Heidi and Chris. But 7 men are down.

I get stopped about 40 feet down the road, lay my bike in the grass and sprint back to the crash site in my cycling cleats. Someone is lying in the road. Teammates are standing behind him waving their arms, stopping traffic. It's Brian S. For a moment I don't know what to do, I'm freaking out. Flashback to Beth's accident washes over me. And then I go sit by Brian's head and start talking to him. He's on his side, bleeding from his mouth. A lot. And moaning this terrible keening sound . . . and I'm SO happy to hear it. He's still with us. Soon he's talking with us -- Chris, Loukas, Peter and me. Then Coach is there, taking charge. Brian wants to roll over, but we tell him he can't -- he has to stay where he is until the EMT guys get there with the neck collar and backboard. But Brian is insistent, he can't breath and his shoulder hurts. REALLY hurts. Coach talks him through assessing his neck and back, and then agrees to let him turn over. We help him, but his left arm just lays there at this awkward angle. We all look at it and then at each other . . . then Brian himself picks it up with his right hand and pulls it against his chest. I cradle his head and then we help him sit up and he leans against me. He's in so much pain. Coach asks him a series of questions to see how disoriented he is, and he's doing well. The ambulance finally arrives and puts the collar on his neck. I empty his jersey pockets so he can lay on the backboard. When they have him strapped down, one cuts his jersey away from his shoulder and it looks bad, swollen and red and jutting out where it shouldn't. I give Coach Brian's wallet and phone and they get in the ambulance and head to the hospital.

Brian's beautiful matte black Cervelo has a big dent in the top tube. And a couple other bikes are out of commission as well. Our follow van takes them and their riders back to the hotel as the rest of us ride slowly, silently through town.

Our banquet is that night and it's subdued. We get several updates from the hospital. Brian's scapula is broken badly and his shoulder is separated. He's being released. I see him the next morning at breakfast and despite road rash on his nose, cheek and lips, looks WONDERFUL. The best sight I could see. As we travel home via bus, airport, and plane, he navigates well one-handed, eschewing much of the help offered him. His shoulder is bad, but Coach has him scheduled to be back on the trainer in a week.

I did end up riding 'The Wall' on Friday. I decided my knee pain was just a bit of tendonitis from the unaccustomed climbing. With ibuprofen and ice, it will be fine. The Wall -- along with all the other hard climbs I did last year -- seemed much shorter and less challenging this year. Still a hard climb, but doable. Very doable. Saturday morning, we spent about 2 hours on a fun, twisty little mountain. Part of the descent is on a dirt road through a farm. A brown cow stood at the edge of the road and mooed at me loudly. She seemed offended at all these cyclists whizzing by. When I got to the paved road, I took the descent more conservatively than I really needed to at first, but then caught up to a group and followed them down. It was good to stretch my legs before spending the day on the bus and airplane.

The thing about cycling, crashes happen. Almost every racer I know can show me their scars. I've watched it happen to women right in front of me in more than one race. I'm lucky that I haven't crashed. Yet. It will happen, it's part of the sport. We have to accept that.