The worst incident I’ve had on the road was while running, not while on a bike. Was a stupid driver rather than anything I did.
I was in high school running on our cross country team. There were 3 of us doing our daily training run. The area we lived in in Glendale was quite hilly which was great training. We ran up a side street and then ran along Foothill Blvd - the main street in town, with the street on our left and the houses on our right.
Just a block or two after we got onto Foothill we came to another side street that didn’t cross Foothall and a guy in a pickup truck pulled up and stopped at the intersection, waiting to turn onto Foothill (he couldn’t have gone straight, could only turn left or right). Being pedestrians about to cross the street we knew we had the right-of-way and we were crossing the side street at the intersection. We all looked at the truck and the driver and decided to keep running. Something we’d done hundreds of times - multiple times on ever run. I was the last in the line of runners. We never stopped running the entire time.
The other 2 of my teammates ran right in front of the hood of the truck and I was the last and shortest in the line. They all passed with no problem (the first teammate in line was a big, tall hurdler from our track team who was close to 6’5") and it seemed like the driver was waiting for us all to pass. Nothing unusual.
However, As I was halfway in front of his truck - almost directly in front of him - he started to pull forward to turn. Even tho we had approached the front of his truck from the driver’s side, he either didn’t see me or care - seemed more like the later - and then he not only kept going but also began to accelerate! Fortunately I was running and my momentum was taking me quickly past his truck. So quickly and instinctually I put my right hand on the hood of his truck and pushed myself up and over the corner of his hood and landed on my feet just past the passenger side of his truck - a very narrow miss.
After I landed and took a couple steps to get past him I looked back to see if he had stopped or was looking sheepish. But he did neither. He just kept accelerating and drove away as if nothing had happened. And to this day I still wonder if he did it on purpose. I don’t know how he could have not seen the last in the line of 3 runners that had all just passed directly in front of his truck and in front of his field of vision as he was stopped and waiting to turn.
I follow an ace Instagram account called Big Dumb Truck Club. A huge number of trucks in the US seem to be ridicukously high and raised, and have terrible visibility. He may just not have seem you through the A pillar. Plus a too high bonnet. I know his truck wasn’t this extreme but HOW are these monstrosities legal?
Yeah, I don’t know how some of those trucks are street legal. Fortunately, I don’t see many at all that are raised that high, even in Nevada where there’s loads of truck people and plenty of desert off-road areas for them to drive on.
Fortunately for me, the truck I encountered in high school (this was 30 years ago) was just a small pick-up. Or I may be misremembering and it was just a car - it was about the same height, either way. I remember more that the guy was wearing a military camo color jacket and I was looking at him straight in the face (tho his eyes weren’t looking at me) right before I vaulted over the corner of his hood (bonnet * cough *). So, I know his visibility wasn’t the issue.
I’ve literally shone 2000 lumens into someone’s retina and they still didn’t see me. It literally did also beam out their ear, which may have been the issue…
Cycled in bad weather in the Alps last summer, long descents in pouring cold rain. “Survived” Covid last August and just to do a systems check me and hubby went for a short easy bikeride past my workplace. I looked too long to the right and some kids playing basketball and suddenly there was a metal fence pole in my path. I though"F**k - don’t wanna hit that!" but did going at about 10 km/h. Fell off - hubby says I did a good handstand - but leapt up pretty quickly. No scraped knees, hands or face but one broken wrist, one badly sprained wrist, some cracked ribs… first words - " Is my bike ok?" followed by me looking at my wrists and saying “gosh they don’t look right”. All healed well thankfully but I am hopefully more focused now on those “easy” rides. And yes the bike was fine - not a mark on it apart from a bent saddle rail
I guess it was because I was sort of panicking not being able to put the wheel back. Haha but I guess you’re right Sir, it’s the right passage just one which has been rarely taken. Pun intended
I just recalled another dumb thing I did on the bike before and it was quite a while back and rather disgusting too.
Held my deposits in for far too long and by the time I decided I could hold it any longer and dismounted the bike to run to the toilet with some farts in between, I felt something warm on the chamois before I could even pull the bibs down and sit on the throne. #TrueStory
Was thankful that I was at riding indoors. On this day.
Lesson learnt: For goodness sake, make the necessary ‘investments’ before riding the bike next time and do not, I repeat, DO NOT hold the deposits in.
That reminds me of the facebook post in Sufferlandria where someone was showing their pain cave but one of their bibs, inside out, was hanging nearby on the side of the main pic and you could see the skid marks on their chamois. Oooops. Pretty sure they deleted it after some embarrassment upon realizing it but the image is embedded firmly in my memory.
All healed well thankfully but I am hopefully more focused now on those “easy” rides. And yes the bike was fine - not a mark on it apart from a bent saddle rail 