Dumbest bike crash ever
October 27th, 2006 | Published in commuting, general
It was apparently my turn yesterday for a bike crash. Here is a shot of the bike:
No pictures of my face, which stopped most of my own momentum. It’s really not that bad, and the beard masks the swelling pretty well.
Almost home from work, I turned on to Hamline heading north, clear street behind me, 2-3 people waiting at the stoplight in front of me. I saw the light turn green, looked behind to see if i could change lanes (since the right lane is a right turn only in the next block), looked back ahead, and WHAM! I think the car at the back of the line had sat for a few seconds before moving for the light, so i ended up a lot closer to it than i’d planned. And going somewhere between 10-15 when i hit. Repeat after me: don’t assume anything in traffic.
As is obvious in the photo, my front wheel wedged under the bumper, and stopped immediately. I had around 30lbs of farm produce in the panniers, so that helped with the inertia somewhat to push the rest of the bike forward a few inches. I think my face hit the corner of the trunk, then i landed on my hip. I got a small cut between my chin and lower lip, but the real action is inside, where i got a good cut on my gums and a beautiful bruise along the inside of my lip. No broken or loose teeth, thank goodness. I was spitting blood for the remaining 4 block walk home.
Two motorists asked if i needed help, bless them. The first one probably saw the crash from behind, and i’m sure it looked impressive. I didn’t know how I looked at the time, but i didn’t feel that bad. The bloody mouth probably didn’t look so hot though. I declined the ride because i figured it would be more trouble wrangling the loaded bike into a car than i would to just walk the rest of the way.
A few aches today, nothing too bad. I’m supposed to race tomorrow, we’ll see about that in the morning. Did i jinx myself by posting about bike safety yesterday?