after 3 months of road cycling, finally had an accident. Rider in front of me didn't notice me speeding up so she moved left into me and to prevent us from both crashing i had to turn away at a high speed, lost balance, and flipped over my bars. Landed head first. Ouch. Helmet lock snapped. 1 hour later, I still have a migraine...

All my friends, who previously opposed wearing helmets cuz they would look like nerds all saw me flip onto my head on the cement road at 15mph. They all want to wear a helmet now. LOL.

I don't think I could ever ride without a helmet after that experience. No cuts no bruises. All 215 of my body mass onto my head like a piledriver. And the sad thing is, I just bought that giro atmos helmet.

thats not a sad thing, its a good thing, and not a moment too soon it seems

I'd go have yourself looked at. Head injury, even protected by a helmet, is nothing to self-diagnose.

Oh... It sounds like you need to pass more carefully in the future... and she needs to learn to bike in a straight line. Collision of two errors here if I understand the situation correctly.

Good that you weren't injured, but even better (for you) that she wasn't, as she could probably have sued and won.

I find that the best way of signaling my intention to pass is by ringing a bell. People can hear it from a longer distance than a verbal signal. Plus, if you say "Passing" or "On your left" or whatever, people tend to turn their head in the direction of the sound, or to look to their left, which pulls them into your path.

But the bottom line is you've got to assume that anyone going slower than you, who hasn't given any indication that they're aware that you are there, will move to the left in front of you. This is particularly true with joggers, who have a tendency to decide that they are at their turnaround point and then just turnaround without even looking.

Nerds don't where helmets.

Amazing how a piece of styrofoam can save your life, innit?

That "migraine" of which you speak is probably a mild concussion. If you're insured, get thee to a doctor. If, like me, your medical needs are met with cash, take it easy, leave the aspirin and/or alcohol alone, and you should be okay in a day or so. Double vision or ringing in your ears is something you really need to have looked at, even if it's out-of-pocket.

Anybody ever gives you krap about wearing a helmet, just tell 'em "My brain is more valuable to me than yours must be to you."

Giro has a 'replacement' program for crashed helmets, check the website for info.
You will need your purchase receipt. If you have any neck pain that definitely
needs to be checked.

lucky you weren't going any faster, just don't rely on it to keep you safe over common sense.

...and this relates to long-distance cycling how?

did you not hear about the long distance fly over the handlebars? I'm lucky to get a jerk out of the saddle. this guy went flyin'

just kidding, I'm sorry about the accident. I've been in a few too.

"Rider in front of me didn't notice me speeding up..."

Am I the only one who thinks that's a very odd thing to say?

Glad you're okay, mate.

The little problem with flying over the handlebars is that your legs get brushed up as you go over them. This starts your body rotating and any accident that stops your bike suddenly is going to result in a good chance of landing on your (or my) head. I hadn't even thought about that but learned it through experience on a downhill stretch at a high rate of speed. There was nothing left of my helmet but the chin strap with a couple of small pieces of foam on each end of it, dangling from my glasses (when I found them).

Landing on my head wasn't the end of my motion. I did take a serious beating with thumps. I did make it to work on time thanks to someone who saw it happen and offered me a ride. There was plenty of visible damage even after I cleaned off the blood. A woman at work said "Good morning" and I answered "Good morning.....sort of," and she had a good laugh at that. It took a few days before I finally got the lenses in my glasses both pointing in the same direction again.

But I was really impressed that one part that wasn't at all sore was the top of my head. The helmet was in pieces, but in a really nice way that saved impact to my head. I don't know if that is a part of the design, but I am really thoroughly grateful that I was wearing it on that ride, as I usually do.

I certainly don't mind anyone else not wearing theirs, but I'm going to be wearing mine. I did post most of this in helmet thread before, but I think there is a bit of value to it. I might not even have been wearing a helmet that day if I hadn't heard so many people talk about the importance of doing that.

brron and Closed_Office, glad to hear that you guys are alright from your respective accidents.

Closed_Office, WOW! Yes, the foam is designed to break apart and to compress on impact. Most of the time, it just compresses at the impact spot. For really hard impacts like yours, it begins to break on the outer edges of the impact zone. All this is so the helmet acts similarly to shock absorber and absorbs the severe forces that come with an impact. The plastic shell on all helmets ensures that when the foam breaks up, you still have something that can be compressed for further shock absorbsion via compression. With out the plastic shell, the broken sections would just become road debris.

flyingcadet

Exactly the reason I haven't ridden without wearing a helmet in the last 8 years and why I'll never ride a bike again unless my head is protected. Helmets really do work!

brron and Closed_Office,

Oh you can call me Closed:) or lloyd. And on the trivia side, most forums let you use
a space in a user name, so you don't need an underscore, and I don't use it. But thanks
for the response.The last thread I posted this to about helmets the only related post
mentioned something about the helmets that broke up (there was another story like that)
were probably left out in the sun. Mine is never left out period, no matter what the
weather, but I wasn't feeling enthusiastic enough to sort that out for the person.

It's encouraging that someone even read something like that and it made an impression.
There were a few more details about it and I guess it might make a nice blog post. One
person has been saying I should add one to the site, and I've been thinking of it and
probably will, except it won't be just about bicycling. I have a few topics all over the
place that I have something to say about (the most important rule in writing as far as I'm
concerned) and I guess I'm going to start doing that.

So thanks for what turned out to be encouragement, and best wishes.