Bruce su

Hi guys,how's everything going with you? Hope you had a nice weekend.
Did you just coming back from your holiday or on the way to it?

Today I would like to share some my opinions about the way to avoid bicycle accidents. Actually, accidents are inevitable, all we can do is to reduce the probabilities. A couple of reasons will cause the accidents, such as poor road conditions, bad bicycle quality or inappropriate riding ways etc.

In recent years, more and more people are interested in bicycle riding, because it is a good way to keep healthy and you can get a lot fun from it. At the same time, the bicycle market are developing at a high speed, so it is difficult for a begineer to make a decision in face of different choices. Some people pay more attention to the price, while others put the quality as their first consideration. As I know, some manufacturers will use inferior material to produce bicycles in order to save the cost, so their bicycles can be sold at a low price. Take carbon bicycle rims for example, bad quality carbon bicycle rims are easier to break in a high temperature compared to high quality carbon rims,following is the picture.
bicycle rim.jpg


Another reason that will lead to a accident is the inappropriate riding ways, take the brake surface for example, experienced riders
will brake their bicycle from time to time when down hill in order to reduce the temperature in the brake surface, while new hands usually keep braking all the way when down hill which will be more dangerous.
brake surface.jpg

Welcome to share more cycling experiences with me...

Maelochs

Don't ride in front of cars?

Machka 

And ...

-- avoid riding on the painted white lines when it rains.

-- exercise caution when crossing railway tracks and wooden bridges.

bboti

I think advice you will be given are pretty region specific.
From Romania: start biking in the city with the mindset that you are invisible for car drivers and you would be responsible for every accidents.
Not a fun ride but brings you safety.

Bruce su

Aha, good idea

StepDown

EVERY accident I have had (total 21) except 1 was because I did something stupid.

steppy

Jim from Boston

How to avoid bicycle accidents?

Quote:

Originally Posted by Bruce su

…Today I would like to share some my opinions about the way to avoid bicycle accidents. Actually, accidents are inevitable, all we can do is to reduce the probabilities...
Welcome to share more cycling experiences with me...

I have been year-round cycle-commuting, road riding, and cycle-touring since about 1972...truly a lifestyle. I was hit by a car in June 2012, and was hospitalized for six weeks, off work for three months, and off the bike for five months.

I recently posted the mental mindset I have developed over the years to keep as safe as possible.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Jim from Boston

Just yesterday, I posted about my concept of Riding Safety Aphorisms ("The Sayings of Chairman Jim"), little sayings that come to mind when I encounter a situation where unseen dangers may lurk, such as:

Quote:

Originally Posted by Jim from Boston

…surely a car door is one of the most frequent and dangerous obstacles. I have an aphorism, “Like a weapon, always assume a stopped car is loaded, with an occupant ready to exit, from either side.”

Quote:

Originally Posted by Jim from Boston

A valuable tip I learned from Bike Forums courtesy of local Metro Bostonian, @buzzman, is to watch the front tires of a car rather than the body or the hood. The car will go where the front tires point.

Others as I recall off the top my head:

• Make yourself visible as possible and assume nobody sees you.
• When riding at night, look for cars, not just headlights.
• Make sure you can see the road surface if you ride over a puddle; a pothole or frozen ice may lurk at the bottom
• Jim’s Law of the Road: "No matter how lightly-traveled or well-paved the road, a vehicle is likely to pass you on the left as you encounter an obstacle in the right."

Then there is my Golden Rule of Cycling: “Do unto the pedestrians as you would have the cagers unto you.”

Finally,

Quote:

Originally Posted by Jim from Boston

… I have a mental analogy of bikes as nimble amphibians compared to autos as lumbering dinosaurs. Like amphibians who can live on land and water,bikes ride on the roads and go off-road, on sidewalks and narrow trails. Our survival depends on not being trampled by the behemoths, so I do everything I can to avoid them, for example when stopped at red lights in traffic.

BlazingPedals

It seems the best way to avoid accidents is to have lots of experience avoiding accidents. Statistics show that accident rates are highest for new riders and decrease from there. Apparently we learn how to be more aware through our initial mistakes.

Garfield Cat

Go off road where there are no cars. Not too early or late to avoid mountain lions that are nocturnal hunters.

indyfabz

Don't text and ride.

wphamilton

Look at it analytically from the standpoint of available accident data, and there are several immediate rules of street riding which will cut your risk of an accident at least in half.

1. Do not ride under the influence of alcohol, even a buzz
2. Lights at night
3. No salmon riding
4. Take extra caution at and approaching intersections, and a corollary to that is
a. avoid sidewalk riding where there are many driveways or busy driveways
5. don't dart out in front of oncoming cars.

There are more rules of course, but a huge portion, more than half, of accidents where causes are recorded list these as contributing factors, in this order of frequency if I recall correctly.

kevindsingleton 

Dang.

Salmon for sale. Only ridden once. Great condition.

Machka 

If you're riding in the rain, don't ride through puddles ... you just don't know how deep they'll be!!

SlinkyWizard

I ride a hybrid, and I recently got bar ends? so when I ride, my hands are nowhere near the brakes, of course, I only put my hands on the bar ends when I can see no need to brake suddenly riding along the bike path next to the river.

So I am riding with the missus, she is in front, I look ahead on the bike path, no walkers / riders coming towards me as far as the eye can see, so I put my hands on the bar ends, we are riding slowly, suddenly, the missus brakes, I react, but not quickly enough, I slightly collide with with her bike, luckily I managed to jump over the handle bars, after twisting the handlebars 90 degrees,

The obvious question, why on earth did you suddenly brake when there is nothing to brake for, or so I thought. Her response was the pigeons that walk on the path, she thought she was going to hit one ( there are many on the path, and all just walk away when you almost run over them )
I would never have thought that a pigeon could have caused a bicycle accident.

What I learnt? Always expect the unexpected. Accidents are accidents, therefore unavoidable at the moment it occurs? At least in this case, the missus will not brake if approaching some birds on the path.

corrado33

How to avoid cycling accidents?

Don't ride.

A cyclist doesn't ride every day thinking "how can I avoid crashing today?"

berner

A list of safety precautions can get very long. In general I try to keep it simple with three overall ideas. Be visible; be predictable; anticipate problem situations.

Cabdad

Announce your intention before overtaking a slower rider on a trail or road. A simple, "On your left!" as you approach.

Jim from Boston

Quote:

Originally Posted by berner

A list of safety precautions can get very long. In general I try to keep it simple with three overall ideas. Be visible; be predictable; anticipate problem situations.

FWIW, I haven’t memorized my list of Safety Aphorisms; rather, they are triggered in my mind when I encounter a myriad of “problem situations” where danger may lurk unseen, such as parked cars, puddles, pedestrians, etc.

BTW, I just noticed your signature line, “Life is complex. It has both real and imaginary parts.” I get your drift.

Seattle Forrest

Be lucky.

berner

I'm not a mathemagician but do appreciate what those folks can do. At one time I was, like everyone else, interested in fractal geometry and had a program that would draw amazing pictures on a computer screen. I don't remember where I picked up that quote but thought it was cute and true.

Kedosto

If you wanna avoid bicycle accidents, don't get on the bike in the first place. I don't know any cyclists that have not crashed. It's part of the process. Like falling while skiing, or getting hit with a pitch playing baseball. Sure, it's not something that should be happening with a high degree of frequency, but sooner or later it's gonna happen. More often when you're learning, less so as you gain experience.

A skillful blend of caution and common sense can help protect you from the worst, but there's nothing that can protect you from every possibility.


-Kedosto

KD5NRH

What if the entire road is flooded up to the tops of the curbs?

One situation where the bike was doing a heck of a lot better than the cars.

DorkDisk

I haven't had a bike accident in almost five months because I've been off the bike the whole time after destroying my meniscus in a bike crash.

Maelochs

Sadly I can claim a pretty similar record ... maybe not quite so bad, but only because I have had more accidents.

And in fact, they really don't. Their minds are scanning for cars and trucks, and they literally will no t register a bicycle approaching down the road sometimes.
This is another A+ Prime bit of advice. If a driver can forget to turn on his lights, he might be too distracted to look for incoming bicycle traffic. Not looking for unlit cars has left me in scary situations a couple times. This is another one that is right on. Splashing through puddles is fun until you hit the rock or stick or sand pile which dumps you hard in front of traffic in the rain when the drivers can't stop as quickly, which is a good recipe for a bad outcome.

When I used to commute in Florida I wouold sometiems ride all the way on the right side of the lane to avoid a puddle, which really PO'd the drivers behind me, but plowing through deep water, crashing, and getting run over is also an inconvenience.

FullGas

you've been down 20 times due to your own negligence...? assuming you weren't racing at the time, that's not a great testament to your riding / situational awareness skills.

there's something called 'avoidance learning' that you're not doing correctly.