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Perfect Storm

734 views 2 replies 2 participants last post by  Mr. Versatile 
#1 ·
I'm 55 yrs young and have regularly ridden off-road motorcycles & bicycles since my 20's. In the past, bicycling was always a means to stay in shape for the off-road riding. In my early 30's, I quit both.

Now in my 50's, I was re-introduced to off-road. It was as much fun as ever, even at slower paces. BUT, I was out of shape. So I dug out the mountain bike.

Last year, I rode approximately 800 miles. My conditioning greatly improved, but still had a long way to go. I found a riding buddy along the way and what started as a means of exercise, was turning into an enjoyable event all on it's own merits. Over the winter, I found I was missing bicycle riding much more than I expected.

Spring rolled around and my riding buddy bought a new Giant Hybrid. Not to be out done, I found a used Trek 7.5 FX. Our riding expanded outside of subdivision roads to include surrounding rural roads. Our typical ride was around 20 miles and included very hilly rural roads with minimal traffic. Already passing 800 miles, my goal of 1,200 miles looked easily achievable this year.

Last week, on a Friday afternoon, we decided to unwind the week with a ride. As with most riders, we keep track of distance and times and are always trying to improve our average speeds. One of the easiest methods is to leverage down hill speed to help with the unavoidable following uphill.

Complacency sometimes sets in. We were 10 miles into the ride and entering our favorite 3-mile downhill section. Towards the end, the road narrows and gets quite steep and is heavily wooded. Our speed was building. We were side by side chatting. I stood up to rest my derriere, was on the brakes hard and hit a pothole hidden in the shadows.

The next thing I know, I was staring straight at the road and thinking Oh @#$#%!, followed by a hard thump. I felt sharp pains on my left side and finally slid to a stop. I found, I could not move, without pain. I was laying on my hydration pack, but unable to remove it. Fortunately, I had my riding buddy with me. He called EMS and then my wife.

The EMS crew was great, but the whole time I kept thinking “How am I here?” “What did I do wrong?” Riding in the back of an EMS is quite unpleasant. Every bump hurts and their suspension is not Cadillac cushy. I spent 12 hours at the local ER. After the first six hours, X-Rays and a head CT scan, they announced that I had a fractured left clavicle (Collar bone) and a couple cracked of ribs. One caveat was every time they tried to sit me up, I would get light headed and nauseous. They assured me that that was due to the pain. BTW, they offered no pain medication. They pushed discharge papers in front of me to sign, despite my constant reminders that I did not feel quite right. Once loaded into the wheel chair and headed towards the door, the light-headedness returned. As we exited the Hospital into the hot-humid night air, I could tell I was going down for the count.

The next thing I remember, was the strong smell of ammonia and the feeling of being covered in sweat. They wheeled me back in and then said that I could either leave, or go back through the admittance process. What the #$%^? Six hours later, I was on my way home.

Over the past week, I spent time pondering the incident and have come to the following conclusions.

Know and test your machines limits and your ability. When I raced off-road, I always practiced braking and turning at or near the bikes (and my limits) under controlled circumstances. I got better and knew what to do in various circumstances. For whatever reason, I have never practiced this on my bicycle. I will in the future. It’s obvious that bicycles are less stable than their counterparts. Assuming they have similar behaviors is incorrect.

Situational awareness. It’s easy to get complacent and misjudge the risks due to familiarity. They can easily compound. I’d been down that road 20 times this year. The speeds increased slowly and I wasn’t paying attention to the associated increase in risk. Distractions like chatting during higher risk situations helped me miss the upcoming pothole. By standing, I had moved my center of gravity forward. Doing so on a steep downhill, moved it even further forward. I was surprised by the jar when I hit the pothole and am not positive, but believe I applied strong left hand brake to boot. You see, the front brake on a motorcycle is on the right side, opposite that of a bicycle. Due to prior training, I do not believe I would have ever intentionally applied substantially more front brake during that situation, except for the control reversal. I may swap the front controls of my bicycle so they are consistent with my KTM.

I’ll continue to ponder for the next six weeks..

Happy Riding, Ride Safe…
 
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