Originally Posted by
rachel120
Yeah, there's a bit of warning, when the bike shifts funny under you. Then -bam- you're on the ground, no perception of time. You may have the memory of those couple seconds, you might not, but those couple seconds aren't happening in your brain as you're going over.
And it still doesn't discount that the shoulder is ridiculously easy to seriously injure and ridiculously hard to get right again from even a minor injury. The shoulder is the most complex joint in the body, which means there's a lot of stuff in there that can go wrong.
It's like you read my post backwards. At speed, by the time you recognize something's wrong, it's too late, and you're on the deck. Those do happen pretty fast.
We were talking (originally) about the 0-speed tip-overs, Like when you roll up to a stop, and then can't get your foot out of the pedal, while the bike slowly tips over, and you go down in a heap like Benny Hill on his tricycle.
In either case, keeping your joints semi-flexed, where your muscles are supporting your weight, rather than locked out and stiff, will reduce the chance of a significant injury.
That, and keeping your hands on the bars.
I have an AC3 in my left shoulder, so yes, I understand the nature of a shoulder separation.