as i got up from the ground..//..'it happens so fast'..

as i got up from the ground after a crash a few nights back,

[still don;t know why, i went over a speed breaker hump,
which i saw, it wasn;t all that tall or odd in any way,
i wasn;t braking, i probably had stood slightly
to allow bike to go over the bump with jarring me - next thing
i know, i'm over the bars [road bike],
my helmet thwacked the road, bike was bouncing over a guard rail
on the side of the road, my shoulder got bumped and scraped.]

anyway, it struck me that every crash i have ever had is just like
that, 'it happens so fast' there is really no time to do anything
specific.

yet one reads advice about crashing -
oh you should be loose,
don;t put your arms out,
roll on the ground, etc.

my question is, how in the hell does anyone have time to DO any of
that?

invariably all i remember is, i am suddenly on the ground, no memory
of doing anything in particular.

it was the same when i hit a left turning car,
when i went over some wet railroad tracks,
when the back tire slipped on wet leaves going up a hill.
when i stopped too fast to 'advise' a motorist who was following too
closely..
wle.

wle wrote:

as i got up from the ground after a crash a few nights back,

[still don;t know why, i went over a speed breaker hump,
which i saw, it wasn;t all that tall or odd in any way,
i wasn;t braking, i probably had stood slightly
to allow bike to go over the bump with jarring me - next thing
i know, i'm over the bars [road bike],
my helmet thwacked the road, bike was bouncing over a guard rail
on the side of the road, my shoulder got bumped and scraped.]

anyway, it struck me that every crash i have ever had is just like
that, 'it happens so fast' there is really no time to do anything
specific.

yet one reads advice about crashing -
oh you should be loose,
don;t put your arms out,
roll on the ground, etc.

my question is, how in the hell does anyone have time to DO any of
that?

Practice. We used to ride along the grass and jump off when we were
kids (and we bounced more easily). I'm sure it's come in useful since.

wle wrote:

anyway, it struck me that every crash i have ever had is just like
that, 'it happens so fast' there is really no time to do anything
specific.

yet one reads advice about crashing -
oh you should be loose,
don;t put your arms out,
roll on the ground, etc.

my question is, how in the hell does anyone have time to DO any of
that?

invariably all i remember is, i am suddenly on the ground, no memory
of doing anything in particular.

I am mentally just fast enough to think "oh sh*t this is gonna hurt"
and recognize my error and then I am on the ground, coming to. Twice
around 15 mph (pea gravel, wet railroad tracks) and once about 30 mph
(wash of sand in road from heavy rains) in the last 20 years. A rate
of bike accidents I can deal with.

App

"wle" wrote:

yet one reads advice about crashing -
oh you should be loose,
don;t put your arms out,
roll on the ground, etc.

my question is, how in the hell does anyone have time to DO any of
that?

It's hard on a bike - I crashed a few weeks ago, and by the time I
knew I was in trouble, the ground was coming up to erase a good bit of
skin off my left side.

I DID have the opportunity to follow the advice above once though...
I was riding with a buddy on motorcycles through the southern Illinois
countryside (being generally young and stupid). (now I'm not young)

Thing is, he didn't tell me the front brake on his heavily modified
Kawasaki 750 triple didn't work. Oops.

So here I am flying down a heavily graveled overshoot "path" sideways
at nearly 80mph, with the bars cranked to the stop trying to catch it.
Then I ran out of rocks and hit the one nice tacky bit of asphalt.
The bike high-sided SO hard it launched me on a long, high trajectory.

The guy I was riding with described it thusly...

"... the bike went end over end a couple times, then rolled a few
times, then started spinning down the road... then you landed".

While I was flying through the air, I had no idea which way was up. I
wasn't wearing any gear (blue jeans, a t-shirt and windbreaker). I
was thinking "so this is what getting killed in a motorcycle wreck is
like". Then I though "no wait, I always told myself to relax".

I distinctly remember having my arms out to my side (not a good idea),
and pulling them in tight and trying to "relax" (probably didn't do a
very good job of that).

Fortunately, I landed off the road in the tall weeds, and mowed down a
pretty healthy patch of 'em by the time I came to a stop. I figured I
was horribly injured, so jumped to my feet to see which limbs were
broken... kind of did a wimpy looking jumping jack.

My buddy, who was simultaneously figuring out what he was going to
tell my next of kin and/or how he was going to get whatever was left
of me to the hospital thought I was trying to fly away.

Maybe.

In the end, I ended up with only some very light road rash in a couple
spots and a shredded windbreaker. Small price, big lesson... always
ride someone else's bike if you're going to crash.

Mark Hickey
Habanero Cycles
http://www.habcycles.com
Home of the $695 ti frame

wle Wrote:
as i got up from the ground after a crash a few nights back,

[still don;t know why, i went over a speed breaker hump,
which i saw, it wasn;t all that tall or odd in any way,
i wasn;t braking, i probably had stood slightly
to allow bike to go over the bump with jarring me - next thing
i know, i'm over the bars [road bike],
my helmet thwacked the road, bike was bouncing over a guard rail
on the side of the road, my shoulder got bumped and scraped.]

anyway, it struck me that every crash i have ever had is just like
that, 'it happens so fast' there is really no time to do anything
specific.

yet one reads advice about crashing -
oh you should be loose,
don;t put your arms out,
roll on the ground, etc.

my question is, how in the hell does anyone have time to DO any of
that?

invariably all i remember is, i am suddenly on the ground, no memory
of doing anything in particular.

it was the same when i hit a left turning car,
when i went over some wet railroad tracks,
when the back tire slipped on wet leaves going up a hill.
when i stopped too fast to 'advise' a motorist who was following too
closely..
wle.

I did one of those a couple of years ago while out for a Sunday ride
with my wife. She still howls with laughter when she tells the story.
We were on a rail trail, and a couple of kids had built a hump beside
the trail where they could catch some air. My wife knows me well enough
to know that when I see something like that, I can't resist it, I just
have to veer off the trail and give it a go. She looked back just in
time to see me do a magnificent face plant in the gravel. The two kids
watching were so stunned to see some old fart that didn't know enough
to act his age take a tumble, that they just stood there with their
mouths open.
In all, it cost me one helmet, one pair of glasses, and a patch of
skin on my forehead. (Oh yeah,and a bit of dignity)


--
Dan Burkhart

"wle" wrote in message
oups.com...
as i got up from the ground after a crash a few nights back,

[still don;t know why, i went over a speed breaker hump,
which i saw, it wasn;t all that tall or odd in any way,
i wasn;t braking, i probably had stood slightly
to allow bike to go over the bump with jarring me - next thing
i know, i'm over the bars [road bike],
my helmet thwacked the road, bike was bouncing over a guard rail
on the side of the road, my shoulder got bumped and scraped.]

anyway, it struck me that every crash i have ever had is just like
that, 'it happens so fast' there is really no time to do anything
specific.

yet one reads advice about crashing -
oh you should be loose,
don;t put your arms out,
roll on the ground, etc.

my question is, how in the hell does anyone have time to DO any of
that?

invariably all i remember is, i am suddenly on the ground, no memory
of doing anything in particular.

it was the same when i hit a left turning car,
when i went over some wet railroad tracks,
when the back tire slipped on wet leaves going up a hill.
when i stopped too fast to 'advise' a motorist who was following too
closely..
wle.


I have a clear visual memory of my most recent crash. It developed slowly -
I was crowded into a curb and I had plenty of time to watch my front tire
scrub along the curb. Then the front tire caught on the curb (the visual
ends here) and snapped to the right. The visual returns with an image of the
sky containing the bike and my feet after a quick tuck and roll. My theory
is that the missed part is when your eyes are closed.

"Don't close your eyes for the crash; you'll miss the best part"

Bruce MacInnes, Skip Barber
Driving School instructor

Dan Burkhart wrote:

I did one of those a couple of years ago while out for a Sunday ride
with my wife. She still howls with laughter when she tells the story.
We were on a rail trail, and a couple of kids had built a hump beside
the trail where they could catch some air. My wife knows me well
enough
to know that when I see something like that, I can't resist it, I
just
have to veer off the trail and give it a go. She looked back just in
time to see me do a magnificent face plant in the gravel. The two
kids
watching were so stunned to see some old fart that didn't know enough
to act his age take a tumble, that they just stood there with their
mouths open.

It's too bad you didn't "clean" the jump.

Once while riding home from work, I came upon a board-&-brick ramp some
10-year-old kids had built. Like you, I couldn't resist, but I got
some good air and landed perfectly, briefcase and all. The kids were
_very_ impressed! "He jumped it!! My God, he jumped it!!"

Wrote:
Dan Burkhart wrote:

I did one of those a couple of years ago while out for a Sunday ride
with my wife. She still howls with laughter when she tells the
story.
We were on a rail trail, and a couple of kids had built a hump
beside
the trail where they could catch some air. My wife knows me well
enough
to know that when I see something like that, I can't resist it, I
just
have to veer off the trail and give it a go. She looked back just in
time to see me do a magnificent face plant in the gravel. The two
kids
watching were so stunned to see some old fart that didn't know
enough
to act his age take a tumble, that they just stood there with their
mouths open.

It's too bad you didn't "clean" the jump.

Once while riding home from work, I came upon a board-&-brick ramp
some
10-year-old kids had built. Like you, I couldn't resist, but I got
some good air and landed perfectly, briefcase and all. The kids were
_very_ impressed! "He jumped it!! My God, he jumped it!!"

You're only truly old when you begin to act your age. Or, put another
way, it's never too late to have a happy childhood.


--
Dan Burkhart

wle wrote:

anyway, it struck me that every crash i have ever had is just like
that, 'it happens so fast' there is really no time to do anything
specific.

yet one reads advice about crashing -
oh you should be loose,
don;t put your arms out,
roll on the ground, etc.

my question is, how in the hell does anyone have time to DO any of
that?

If you do a lot of mountain biking you get much better at crashing.
Most road cyclists just never crash enough to get good at it. Usually
you don't have time to think, it's a matter of reflexes. Some people
have great natural reflexes. My wife can frequently unclip during a
crash and land on her feet running -- a trick I've never mastered.

My experience has always (well, one exception) been that I
immediatelly know when I've lost it. From there the whole event takes
place in slow motion, with me sort of observing the whole thing as it
happens, unable to do anything to stop it.

The one exception was when I was rear ended by a motorcycle and went
down hard and fast.