A gokarting accident

It's been a couple weeks since this happened but here's what happened.

Was gokarting with some buddies down at Oklahoma Motorsports Complex, south of Norman on a Saturday. We ran a bunch of heats, racing one on one and many combinations of types of races.

Our last race, all five of us lined up at the start/finish line and took off at the same time. Since I...uh...ahem...weigh a little more than the rest of the guys, I went into the first turn last, but I took advantage of the other guys racing hard. I made a great turn and was able to pass two guys. Going around the middle of the track, I was trying to set up the guy in front of me. As the track turned in on itself (see map), I was able to cut Turn 7 and go wide and round into Turn 8. As we apex'd 8, the guy in front of me got a little loose. I reacted and tried to go around him to the left. As I was brushing his side, I got hit real hard by one of the guys that had driven into 8 too hard and flat. My cart went airborne, but luckily, did not flip. I was tossed from the kart and thought I had just landed on my knee and hip. No big deal...or so I thought.

Apparently, I had put my left arm down instinctively. I did not realize that anything was wrong and so I quickly made to get back into the cart and finish the race. But then I found that my arm wasn't quite right. I looked down and my left arm was bent the wrong way...backward. It startled me and I jerked the arm and it went back to a "normal" bent position but was still quite dislocated. I thought it might be broken at first, but the intense pain wasn't there so I considered dislocation.

Here's what my arm looked like at the ER. Sorry for the extreme non-buffedness of the pic.

As nasty as that is, that injury isn't the one that pisses me off the most. I also broke my right thumb. The thumb hurts more and keeps me and invalid more than the arm does. So I have issues with both limbs, making it difficult to work, play, eat, you name it. sigh....

I've healed a bit over the two weeks. Just about all of the COPIOUS bruising is gone. My arm is still weak, but I don't have to wear the sling much anymore. I just have to be very careful of what I do with the arm. I have torn ligaments in my elbow that will have to heal and get stronger. My broken thumb....sigh...It's gonna take a while to heal. I think I tore is up pretty bad in addition to breaking it. It's not very functioning, although it's getting a little better.

I go to the doctor for a follow up in a couple of days. I'm sure he will want me to do torture...I mean physical therapy. I really don't want to do that. I have some dumbbells that I can work my arm with. We'll see.

Will I go gokarting again??? Not just yes!!

But not yet. I have to heal and anyway, it's too dang cold right now to be doing that.