undisputed83

Before I get to that, this is how my day started. I normally work 3pm to 11pm at a local hotel by the mall. But today I had to go in this morning by 7:15am for an hour or so to a small project. My Raleigh Technium is in the shop (Primary Commuter), so I had to ride my Felt F35. The back tire has a leak, but a really slow one. I pump it up and it retains the air like I expected. I get the front tire close to my usual 100psi, and I'm about at 90, and the tube bursts. I'm frantically searching for a tube with a long enough stem for that type of wheel, but I can't find one. And even the emergency tube in my seat bag has too short of a stem because I'm a knucklehead. So my boss, who is definately the coolest supervisor I have ever worked for comes to pick me up, since i don't have a car or a rideable bike. I do my stuff at work, and come home.

Ernies Cycle shop was nice enough to bump my bike to the front of the line to get the wheel trued and the hub loosened, so I go pick it up, along with a couple of tubes for my Felt. And I end up riding in my Raleigh to work this afternoon at 3pm for my regular shift.

So I work my shift and get out at 11... I ride down the access road that cuts through the sable oaks golf course and make a right onto spring street. I'm new to cold weather riding, the temperature was about 40 degrees, and felt a bit colder on the bike. I was wearing a winter hat, gloves, and neck warmer in addition to my fleece, and I decided that I wanted to adjust the neck warmer. So I'm riding along and decide to pull my left glove off so I can pull down the neck warmer, which I was able to do. I then go to put my glove back on and all of a sudden the bike veers to the right and my coordination becomes very unstable... I tried to recover and nearly did before I started wobbling again VERY narrowly missing the curb. There is no sidewalk on that section of spring street. There is just the curb at the edge of the breakdown lane, and it immediately becomes grass.

So as I intially almost tripped over the curb, nearly recovered, and lost stability again... The split second thought goes through my head that I JUST got my bike back, and if I try to ride this out and fail... me AND the bike are going down hard, and I could easily tweak my wheel or my handlebars... And for the love of everything that is good and holy, I did NOT want to go back to the shop.

So as I'm still struggling to "right the ship," I decide it's not worth going down and taking the bike with me so I kind of chased the bike towards the curb and used my right foot on the grass to spring myself off the bike... and as I did my body still had a lot of foward momentum from the bike and I went head first through the air and came down on my right side fairly softly and rolled into somewhat of a summer sault. My bike seemed to land somewhat gracefully (as much as it could have anyway) on the grass and suffered no damage. My rear headlight popped off, but didn't break.

Had there been a side walk there instead of grass, I wouldn't have ditched the bike. I would have tried to ride it out and at best had a 50% chance of saving it. But I wasn't sure I could avoid the curb a second time. I scraped my elbow to the point it bled, but it's not really picture worthy.

So my lesson for the day is to be a lot more careful when adjusting gear!

gerv 

Two takeaways: 1) learn to fix your bike 2) avoid curbs. Like you, I learned it the hard way.

diff

I fell the other day too Me and a co worker went to pick up some food on break. I had a lot on my mind I think and cranked my straps down without even realizing it. We pull up to the stop light about a block away and go to pull out my foot and nothing. Try the other foot and nothing. I knew I was going down so straightened the bike pushed it away from me. My brooks saddle got nicked and end of my handlebar did too.

1st fall on my new bike and was embarrassing as hell. Won't happen again.

But its funny. Like you I was thinking of protecting my bike.

safariofthemind

Man, bad days happen. You try and learn from it. I ruined a couple of front wheels in University before I got more cautious. Costly mistakes are tuition at "Life University".

mikeybikes

If you learn anything, at least from the morning, its that you don't have enough bicycles.

MVclyde

Ain't that the truth. +1

Cyclaholic

You did the right thing which was to consider the welfare of the bike first and foremost.

boro

Seriously, I broke my chain in an intersection the other week. Smoked my knee and lost the chain. That was a fun walk home. Never again!

undisputed83

LOL... exactly... Mother nature isn't going to heal my bike. But it will sure heal my elbow!

digger

<----------- Hence the name.

capejohn

Haven't taken a digahh in a long time. Haven heard anyone say diggahh in a long time either.