Beau210

Just crashed at the UT Austin race. Sprinting up the hill on the last mile and a half and the guy next to me swerves into my wheel. I took out four others, wrecked my helmet, and have some nasty road rash. Should I be mad or is that just part of racing?

Beau210

Tagaderm burns!!!!!!!!!!

Homebrew01

It is part of racing, but hard not to be upset at whatever caused the crash.

Walter

Both.

Fat Boy

It's fine to be mad (although it doesn't change anything), but it's more important to learn from the crash. There is something you could have done to avoid it. Figure out what that is.

Beau210

We were sprinting up the last hill with a group of about twenty survivors. I was on the very inside and out of the saddle. The tulane guy next to me came out of the saddle to start hammering and swerved into my front tire. Nothing I could do but watch as I crashed into the middle of everyone and since I was in about fourth place almost everyone had to swerve to miss me. One guy ran right into my back as I was curled up and went flying. I felt really bad but I don't think there is anything I could have done.

Beau210

The road rash is on my left knuckles, side of hand, elbow/ forearm, and shoulder. How often should I change the bandage and does this stuff hurt to take off as much as it does to put on?

Hida Yanra

I'm not sure that you "should" be mad - feel free to be grumpy if you like.
Yes, it is part of racing.

Walter

Anger is a normal reaction. "Blanking blanker couldn't hold his blanking line.." and etc. Holding onto the anger is the counter-productive thing though. Things happen and some of the guys you too out probably got mad at you even though there doesn't seem to have been much you could do about it.

Road rash on the hand sucks.

ericm979

You could not have been next to him in the first place. Play the last part of the race back in your head and think about how you could have predicted this rider would do something like that. It's often possible to spot people who will do dumb things long before they do them. Not by their kit or their bike, by how they ride. Try to not have them around you.

You could have avoided the bonehead blundering into you. You could have not let him take you down. Some people practice bumping for that reason.

If you just declare that there was nothing you could have done, you won't learn anything from it. Then there really will be nothing you can have done because you shut off your brain.

Whenever I have a crash or a close call, in cycling or motorcycling or driving, I always replay it in my head and try to learn from it. The lesson may be simple, like "pay attention you idiot". Or more complex and not easily described, like identifying people about to do something dumb.

Also, if you're a "survivor" then you're not contesting the win or a top 10. Might consider not sprinting since there's no practical difference between 30th and 35th.

Fat Boy

+1 ericm. Thanks for taking the time to write that so I didn't have to. Perfect.

Beau210

You're right I should have been able to predict he would do that. looking back he didn't have the best handling skills during the race. By survivor I mean the other thirty or so guys had fallen off the back. I was in about fourth overall.

Hida Yanra

Ericm979 - you are a true BF hero. thanks :-)

ericm979

If there's only a few guys up the road they're the break and you're in the pack. The survivors are crawling in behind the pack.

It's good that you only have road rash and your helmet did its job. Road rash doesn't hurt that much and it heals fast. My last crash involved a 30mph face plant. The road rash on my face healed in a couple weeks with no scars. I still have scars on my knees though and I had to wear braces on my teeth for a few years and all my front teeth are dead.

BTW my lesson there was don't look to the side in a fast descending pack of people I don't know well because there might be a bonehead on the front who slams on his brakes. It was a hard way to learn something that basic.

carpediemracing 

It's not just before the incident that counts, it's also during the incident. If you're going into a sprint you know people are going to be sprinting. If he can get out of the saddle and hit your front wheel then you were pushing the risk level. You were in some way overlapped with his back wheel. If you were already sprinting and you couldn't get by him then maybe you weren't meant to pass him. If he was that rough then you should have had the wherewithall to back off and start up again.

To shoot through small gaps you have to shoot through. It's not plodding along next to the other rider.

It's better not to be in a situation where someone can touch your front wheel. Sometimes it can't be helped but it's something you have to be aware of when you go into such a situation.

I'm assuming you were in the drops so you had as full control over your bike as possible. On the hoods it's simply impossible to react as decisively as you can when on the drops of a properly fit bike.

Although it's not as sexy as a carbon wheelset I think a small camera under the stem (or better, on your helmet) would do wonders for your racing tactics/safety. I raced for a long time before I raced with a helmet cam and I was surprised at how inaccurate some of my memories were of incidents that took place during a race. Now I race and ride with one all the time because video never lies.

Two examples of sprints where there was some movement.

First, lots of movement going into the sprint. Note that I'm moving decisively faster than the others until I'm in the wind on my own.

Second, in the actual sprint a guy starts coming over from the right. I ease, ready to go to his right, but when I realize I can go through the gap I do.

Video footage invites brutally honest assessment of your riding/racing.

grolby

Very well put.

AzTallRider

This really strikes home with me, as three weeks ago I crashed in the UCSB Poor College Kids RR M45+. 5 fractured ribs and a partially collapsed lung. I've replayed things over in my mind so many times I can no longer tell what is a true memory, and what I might be filling in. Racer Ex was in the race, but too far back to see the sequence of events. As is the case 90%+ of the time, someone's rear wheel connected with my front wheel. That part is easy. The hard part is... why? There is almost never only a single cause. Most often, when someone makes a mistake, someone else compensates, and all is fine. That happens constantly, in any race. But when someone goes over the line of perfect riding, and someone else does as well (often in response), then stuff happens. With the help of others, I've come to the conclusion that, yes, I F%$#ed up. Actually, that part is easy too. After all, I went down, right? The hard part is that it isn't a clear "I did X, and Y resulted". In fact, FWIW, I'd probably do almost exactly the same thing again, though probably just a little bit differently. It's all because of that bottom line question: "Whose job is it to protect your front wheel?" The answer doesn't even need to be recited.

In my instance, it was a situation where nobody in my vicinity wanted to give up places, as we were approaching the defining feature (a climb, naturally) of the course. The pack was shifting, from the middle having been moving up a bit, to the left side moving up. I was one rider in from the left side, and then there was the yellow line. There was a gap up and to my left. I moved into it. As I did, someone moved left into my wheel. I managed to separate, but that put me into the rider to my left, who protected himself by shouldering me back. I reengaged (I think with the same wheel that had hit me), and that time, when I broke off, I was headed through the pack diagonally, and thought I might stay up, but then saw that my front wheel was sideways to the direction I was traveling. I flipped, landing (fortunately) more on my back than my shoulder. Helmet in three pieces, blah blah blah.

So what should I have done differently? Two options:

A. It was early in the race. Had I been more confident in my climbing ability relative to the pack (several colorful sleeves, and I normally race 55+ rather than 45+), then I would have eased off instead of pushing up into the gap.

B. Having decided to fill the gap, I should have been more decisive in taking it. I allowed too much time, and that time let stuff happen. Had I moved more quickly into the spot, I believe all would have been fine.

Bottom line is that, to stay as safe as we can, we need to really aggressively and proactively protect that front wheel. Sure there are times (like CDR's race where the guy intentionally strafed the whole front of the race) when it is almost impossible to protect yourself. But most of the time, we can protect ourselves. That's a vital skill we all need to have, and it's the reason Masters tend to stay up more than other categories. It's not that mistakes aren't made, or that there isn't sketchy riding, it's that other people make up for the mistakes more often. The fact that only one other guy went down when I did is a testament to that, and I'm thankful that he was able to get back up and keep racing. Because while it is always easy to blame the guy who hits someone's front wheel, it isn't always that clear cut. It is almost always a shared responsibility: a chain of events. I am the one who pressed into a tightening pack, didn't get to the spot quickly enough, and went down when hit. I don't know who the other guy was, and I don't care who it was. I'm not going to waste time or energy, or misplace my priorities, by focusing on anything he did. I'm pretty new to this whole thing. I need to learn everything I can from this, to lessen the odds of it happening again. I paid a price, and I want to get all I can for that payment.

So, IMO, we don't want to take responsibility for other's mistakes, and we don't want to get so cautious it messes up our riding, but we surely want to do all we can to keep the rubber side down: our's and other's as well.

grolby

Great post TallRider, and that's a point I try to impress on other racers on my team: we do not always have control of what other people do, but we actually have more power to avoid being crashed by the mistakes of others than many assume/claim. We all know riders who crash a lot, always because of something the other guy did. But if you can't avoid those sketchy riders when they screw up, how do you explain the riders who are seldom or never crashed by others? Luck just isn't a sufficient explanation for that.

Beau210

Thanks for sharing guys. This will all help me a lot moving forward. On the negative side I think my left hand is broken. Its pretty swollen and tender although I still have some hope that it may just be some bruising.

merlinextraligh

You need to go get that X rayed if its not better today.

Good on you for listening to the advice here. it's how everyone gets better.

rkwaki

On my way to a conference call but here's a little insight.
In all my years of racing I have crashed once (2010 when I separated my shoulder/crushed my wrist) and been taken out once (2010 had a fellow racer of equal aggression get the jump on me and put me in a curb with 4 laps to go). Though I was pissed in both instances (threatened to punch the guy out that caused it in both cases) in all reality I will take responsibility for both.
In the wreck where I got broken up we were in a two man break second to last corner I told the guy to pull through, he clipped a pedal and took me down. I should have dropped the hammer earlier and dropped him as I had the other guys initially in the break.
In the second example I should have ridden more aggressive as I knew I was wrestling with a fellow pitbull (fighting over a former world champs wheel setting up for sprint) - I let my guard down for just a moment and he got me.
I have since written a letter of apology to USAC for my behavior that day as I was pissed, in the end I was more pissed at myself than anyone else.

Lesson to be learned? Always have the mindset that some is going to crash you out and play the scenario through your head as to how you could be wrecked. If you are always aggressive it keeps your senses alert to prevent it from happening.

ericm979

Good luck with the hand Beau. I hope nothing's broken.

carpediemracing 

A thought, although it won't help with your hand right now. I always race with long finger gloves and almost always ride with them, even when it's brutally hot out. I've skinned the fingertips off my hands off and it's really, really unpleasant. You can't do a lot of every day things and you really can't type at all. So long finger gloves. I use mtb type gloves in the summer, they're usually pretty well ventilated. Yes it's more "pure" riding bare handed. It's also more "pure" riding without a helmet on. I used to ride more "pure" out of ignorance, back in the days when there really weren't helmet standards etc. Now I always wear a helmet and I (almost) always wear long finger gloves (only when I forget I don't wear the gloves, maybe couple times a year).

I hope your hand is okay. Definitely get it checked out.

Beau210

I am def. going to wear gloves from now on. The funny thing is I had some in the car to keep my hands clean while I put on my wheels and then didn't wear them during the race. Also I'm a huge believer in helmets now as mine saved my life. Best $200.00 I've ever spent.

grolby

Good luck with the injuries, Beau!