bikebuddha 

yesterday on my way home for lunch i took a left and in my haste i let my pedal hit the ground. well down i went, hard, broke three ribs and my shoulder blade so i'm off the bike for a while. helmet saved my brain as my head struck the pavement and slid along the ground. i also want to thank the driver who did'nt run me over and the four people who stopped to make sure iu was ok.


becareful out there

Gus Riley

Ouch! I hope your recuperation is rapid.

Marylandnewbie

Wow, take it easy and I hope you recover quickly.

slvoid

Nice, how fast and tight was the turn?

DCCommuter

Is your bike OK?

I'm sorry to hear this, good luck on a rapid recovery. You should be able to ride fairly soon, although I'm sure you don't feel that way today.

jyossarian

This thread is worthless w/o pics. Glad to hear you're ok BB. Heal up soon!

thdave

I'm convinced that my biggest safety concern is myself. You validate that! Sorry to hear about your crash.

It is easy to lose a little focus on a turn or get distracted going through a turn you've done 50 times and a second later end up on the ground. I could have fallen a dozen times already--but I've only gone down once in the last 10 years. I'm lucky.

LittleBigMan

Dude, hang in there and get better soon!

GTcommuter

Ouch. I clipped a pedal the other day but wobbled and stayed up.

The ATL commuters have taken a beating recently. LBM, you and I better stay healthy.

squeakywheel

Bummer. Get well soon.

Was it a fixed gear bike? Just curious. Not coming from a bicycle racing background, I tend to coast through corners.

bikebuddha 

thanks for the support guys

slvoid, not that sharp but i was going plenty fast.

yossarian trust me you dont want to see the road rash on my shoulder, i thought my kids were going to pass out.

dccommuter, it appeared my rear derailer was pretty twisted up and three blinkees had to be recovered from the street. luckily i went down right in front of my sister-in-law's office so she took care of my bike while the paramedics checked me out.


funny part was that the paramedics were checking my helmet for damage and on the side i have an xtra cycle "god grant me the courage to sell my car" sticker, he asked me if i wanted to reconsider and i said "no way!" he cracked up.

oboeguy

NICE. Get better soon. I hope you've learned your lesson, though...























ALWAYS TELL US HOW THE BIKE IS FIRST!!!

slvoid

I guess the lesson here is don't pedal through a turn and keep your inside pedal up.

squeakywheel

That's what I do. I also brake pretty agressively before going into turns. Both are due to safety instincts (i.e. fear of pedal strike and loss of traction). I'm not going to win any road races with my cornering technique.

bhchdh 

Heal well, and soon.

Crazy Cyclist

What surprises me most is that four people actually stopped to see if you were OK. If htat was in Winnipeg, they would have kept driving.

MichaelW

I've had pedal strike a couple of time, going over high speed bumps and cornering on a reverse camber. It has never toppled me although it has come close. It usually happens when there is too much stuff happening to remember to raise my cranks, perhaps a pedestrian crossing the road plus a car coming up to fast.
Did you have toe clips/clipless? If not, did the strike dislodge your feet from the platforms? Does your bike have aparticularly low BB/long cranks?

jyossarian

That's cuz its too cold to get out of their cars.

I've had pedal strike a couple times before, either in turns or on curbs when I'm too far over trying to pass, but never got toppled. It's definitely a weird feeling.

Illah

I've always done it this way, thought I went down pretty hard once when my rear tire hit a smooth, wet sewercap mid-turn. Now especially when I rains I turn like a grandma - slow down to like 5 mph

--Illah

roadfix

Bet that was painful. Hope you recover quickly....
That said, never hammer through a tight turn on a fixed gear...

recursive

I pedal through turns on my fix all the time. (unless I am skidding)

I have had a couple of pedal strikes too (on other bikes) but never fallen as a result. Good luck.

slvoid

If you want I'll design a clutch for you so you can grab it and corner REAL low on a fixed before pedaling again.

TrevorInSoCal

I'm ashamed to admit that my first reaction to this was "whoah, that would be cool.", upon examination though I realize that would totally defeat the purpose of a fixed-gear, which, for me, is all about simplicity...

I've had pedal strike a few times, but nothing bad enough to knock me down (yet). I can skid, but I'm not yet adept enough that I can comfortably go into a corner fast and skid through the apex, as I've seen some fixed riders do in sharp corners. I usually just slow way down and turn wide...

-Trevor

MacG

Ouch! I hope you recover quickly!

When these threads happen, everyone starts asking about BB height, crank length, pedal style, etc. There are so many variables that factor into pedal strike that maybe we should all measure our bikes in a standard way to see who is best and worst off.

I propose the following: rotate the cranks so that one pedal is at bottom dead center (closest to the ground, for you non-engineer types) and lean the bike over on a flat level surface. Measure the angle of lean when the pedal just touches the ground. Maybe measure the angle when there is 1/4" of clearance or something. This might make a great poll thread.

recursive

I've got my bike next to me. How do you measure angle of lean? It looks like about 50 degrees, but I doubt that's very accurate. Maybe +/- 10 degrees.