Team USA - Gyor, Hungary

I have been working on this blog all day...it is a long one....it is about our trip to Gyor, Hungary....I promised Renie that I would write about my trip there...so back up to the reason that we had the privilege of going is because my husband qualified to race for Team USA....he is a triathlete, he runs duathlons, marathons and adventure races....he is an amazing man. Flashback to September 11, 2001, he awoke from a coma the day the trade centers fell....He was in ICU and all the nurses had the television sets all on the news....Chris being a Captain for the Dallas Fire Department woke up to confusion...he thought that he had been in it or caused it....he was in a huge state of confusion.

Just 3 days earlier on his birthday....Chris was on a training ride for an upcoming race for the next couple of days....he was riding his bike and was coming around a corner and was hit head on by a truck who happened to be driven by a life long friend...it also happened to be the first day that our friend had taken his cell phone with him to the hay fields that he was headed too....Chris was knocked unconscious and was hurt bad....my friend called 9-1-1 and immediately they arrived out in the country and knew that he wouldn't make it if he were transported....I happened to be home that day and they called me at home to come and be by his side...they didn't know if he would live through the accident....his left side was crushed...and he was care flighted to the nearest Level 1 Trauma unit over an hour away. They flew the helicopter right to the scene and shut down traffic...I got to see him right before they put him in the helicopter. Once he arrived at the hospital...he underwent a long surgery and the doctor's couldn't figure out where he was bleeding from....they opened him up and had to repair his spleen, remove the lower lobe of his left lung, his left kidney, all of his ribs on the left side were broken, his scapula was broken (he has a curve in his upper back because it today), his hip and his left hand. Doctor's didn't know if he would make it and said that he would be on the ventilator for at least 3 weeks....what do they know...God is bigger than that...we started praying...the first day I was in shock, but the second day as I was staying in an apartment, I layed in my bed and was crying out to God...I envisioned myself laying in God's lap and letting Him rub my head and comforting me....He led me to a scripture in Psalms and at that moment, I knew that he would live and that he would be okay....I woke up with such peace and began to comfort those that came to visit him....he was unrecognizable.... Chris woke up on the third day and pulled out his tube...and was talking. Since he was in ICU...there were only certain times that I could visit...I walked in and to my surprise, he was awake and alert...he asked me who I was and I was scared he had forgotten me....I told him that I was his wife and he asked me that if I were to die on my way home, did I know if I would go to Heaven ....I said yes reassuring him of that fact....he asked if we had any children...I can't tell you how terrified I was to tell him that we had six children thinking that he would go back into a coma....but reluctantly I told him...he said bring them here right now...I have to know if they would go to Heaven if they died....he asked everyone that came into his room that question and his Chief from the fire department because of the question that was posed accepted Christ into his life.

He came back from his accident and had a race 7 months to the day of his accident and placed second...amazing and a miracle as well as an inspiration...and then last year, he qualified to race with Team USA against 32 other countries...in Gyor Hungary....and here are just some of our pictures of our trip.

(If you click on the pictures, you can see a better view of what we were seeing)

This is Chris waiting for our flight at JFK airport, annoyed with me for taking pictures.

We arrived in Gyor Hungary and went to our room with no AC and was shocked when we saw the way our beds were arranged. We had to sleep head to head or feet to feet.
This was our first night in Gyor with Team USA eating out and enjoying getting to know our new friends.
Our first trip to Budapest.
I took a lot of pictures of all the building because the architecture was gorgeous and hundreds and hundreds of years old, much older than anything in the states.
On our tour, we saw a homeless man sleeping in the park.
This bridge was amazing and had so much history to it...if only I could remember the history...our ear phones that were in about 17 different languages kept going out and we couldn't hear every word that was said.
These are our new traveling buddies...Dick and Barb Morgan from Pennsylvania...we traveled with them to Virginia and are staying with them again the end of September in Rimini Italy where Chris qualified again for Team USA this year. Did I mention that he will be 51 years old?
Chris and I changing buses for the rest of the tour through Budapest.
This was an old building, part of a castle I think...may be wrong on that one.
We are on one side, I can't remember which side is Buda and which side is Pest, one is flat and the other is mountainous separated by the Danube.
This building held artillery and it actually blew up inside accidentally and since has been restored.
This bridge was famous for those that wanted to commit suicide...the commentator said most of them just wanted attention. It is over the Danube.
This is their version of the statue of liberty. You can't see the beautiful waterfall coming from the bottom of it.
This was a gorgeous monument...the archangel Michael is on the top
Dick and Barb Morgan
This guy was in the square of Gyor and his music was very calming and was form Ecuador.
This was our favorite part of the trip. We met Red from Australia and he went on the train ride with us all the way to Vienna Austria...he was from Europe, had been in a prison camp and had to defect (if that is the term) to Australia and couldn't tell his family where he had gone or they would have been tortured...it was amazing just listening to him....if you look closely...he looks more like Chris than Chris' own dad. Believe it or not, he was in his 80's and was doing the race and placed in his age group, he was our blessing in the whole trip...he was going to Vienna to meet his sister and brother-in-law...we had the privilege of getting to meet all of them and loved them so much. We hope to see him again in Rimini Italy this September. Such a humble and gracious man. He became our tour guide. Oh we all wanted to just bring him home with us. We will never forget him.
Red told us how to travel through Vienna so that we could see everything, so the next few pictures are of Vienna, such a beautiful city and most of the people there spoke English which was wonderful...they didn't in Gyor where we were staying.




These guys were all over the city promoting a play or a theatre act, can't remember, but they were hilarious....we really had a lot of fun with them....you can tell by their poses.
This was inside the church....organ...absolutely gorgeous. This church was hundreds and hundreds years old.





I am not sure what this is, but I thought that I would get out of the sun and rest my legs, Chris thought he would take a picture of me sitting in it. We were on the Danube watching a wedding that was going on a boat that was docked....I felt like an imposter looking on...but it was gorgeous and sweet.
The day of the race....the countries were lining up for the Parade of Nations.
Across the street, Team USA including Chris is lining up for pictures before the parade down through the center of Gyor. If you click on the picture, you can see there are only a few of them....these are all the ones that qualified from Texas. There were a total of about 105 on the team.
Getting everyone lined up and ready for the parade. We are getting very excited here at this point to be a part of something like this is amazing.
The band leading the countries, one by one all lined up.






















TEAM USA....YEAH...my husband Chris looking at me.


We had to walk around the naked momument in the center of the square. I just had to take a picture of him, but I spared you the private areas, and believe me, it was all there.

People were flying flags out of their homes cheering us on....this was a neat part of the parade....they made you feel really welcomed.
The countries are all lining up being introduced....Gyor had a huge party for everyone, thousands of people wth food and plenty of entertainment.
Introducing TEAM USA....YEAH!!!!!


Dancers like you have never seen before....they were awesome
These girls and guys danced with bottles on their heads.


The first day of the race and Dick and I are looking for our spouse's so that we can take pictures...they started the women after the men....so that it would be staggered and not so packed.
We can see the race site from our balcony window.
Just part of the race site below and the deadly corner they had to take.
They were taking this corner so fast that they had to put hay bales out for crashes...I was in our room filming above them...you could see everything from up there.
Chris in his Team USA uniform getting ready...contemplating his moves.
These are just two other of the friends that I made, Holly on the left of me is a lawyer in Florida as well as her husband that is racing....a true Lifetime movie was made after their lives....together they got a lady out of prison who had been wrongfully accused....but on the Lifetime movie, they combined the characters and made them into one lawyer being a woman....neat story and Debbie on my right whose house was in the movie Hoosiers...and her and her family were actually in one of the scenes in the living room of their house in the movie...I still need to check it out and watch it again just so I can see her.... She works on setting movie sets up now, amazing and precious women.
Holly and Debbie
Chris in transition...came in from running and now getting on his bike before coming in again and running another 5 miles to finish after biking over 20 miles and running the first time over 5 miles....only an animal can do that. If you notice, there are not many bikes in yet....that is a good sign. He did place right in the middle of his age group our of hundreds of great athletes...the best of the best. Chris was just honored to have qualified.
Chris right after the race....it was extremely hot...he was sticking out his tongue for the camera shot. He was beat!!! Another view from our balcony.
TEAM USA award ceremony that night...the women getting recognized.
The men getting recognized...Chris is in the back with the white cap.

It was a great trip and we met a lot of friends and we became like family....we will see most of them this year again and some new ones. Team USA is racing in Rimini Italy this year...we will be going the end of September and staying over for vacation...we will visit Florence, Bologna, Rome and a few other places while we are there. I am so excited about going. It will be here before we know it....I will make sure that I take lots of pictures and I will definately post them.