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Saturday morning, cruising down to see my buddy on my Stingray. Taking the traii through the bush that comes out right across from his place. As I near the end of the trail, I see buddy's sister and her cute friends hanging out in his front yard. There's a deep, wide ditch at the end of the trail, so the trail takes an almost-90-degree bend so you can navigate across the ditch at an angle. I'd been perfecting my skidding skills, and concluded that 12-year-old girls would be pretty impressed if I skidded to a sideways stop at the lip of the ditch, a roostertail of mud arcing through the sky, me, framed majestically against the forest.
With a cry of something eloquent like, "Hey, Cindy!" I execute my skid to perfection, stopping right at the lip of the drop. I teetered for a moment, put my foot down into open space, and tumbled over into the ditch with my bike on top of me. I untangled myself from my bike, spit out a big mouthful of grass and mud, dragged my bike out of there and walked past all of them like nothing had happened. As soon as I went around the corner of the house, there was a big burst of laughter. Probably some "girl" joke. All things considered, I think I was pretty suave. |
I somehow manage to get grease on my legs on almost every ride.
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Sorry to dredge up old threads but this is the funniest thing I have read in a long time.
Thanks for the laughs. Cheers, Brian |
Originally Posted by voltman
I'm still afraid to let go of the handle bars to move my hands.
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I was passed while on my trainer in the basement.
I've never been on a road bike off of a trainer or outside. My training rides are in 42/19 right now. 14 mph is blazing fast to me. I just bought clipless pedals and shoes. I am thankful that my bike is still in the trainer! I have bought cars that were cheaper than my bike, but it still does not make me faster. I am sure I will fall, fail to clip out, and get dropped by women, children, goats, water buffalo, whatever. It is all part of the improvement process. I am doing a team duathlon because I know I can't bike AND run in the same day. |
Originally Posted by gapowermike
Congratulations. I fell from failure to unclip at a crowded intersection and provided laughs for the rush hour crowd fortunate enough to be passing by that morning.
I stopped to let 2 ladies cross the road and had a captain crash - but they were very helpful and apologised like it was their fault. hmm females... |
Originally Posted by DXchulo
Ok, I'll admit it:
I can't ride no-hands. I know, I know....I'm ashamed of myself. |
I'm also afraid to let go of the bars. I can't spin and drink at the same time that well either.
And I'm real ugly too. |
I recently had a forgot-to-unclip-and-fell incident in my driveway. Managed to bounce my head on the side of my car on the way down, too. A quick look around confirmed that there were no witnesses, so I started to extricate myself from the pile I was in. I then heard a strange noise, almost like two pieces of 60-grit sandpaper rubbing together. I looked up, and saw my cat in a second floor window. He was looking down at me...and laughing. I swear, that cat hates me...
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- Was lapped 4 times in my first ever bike race.
- Drove 4 hours for a 150 mile race ... left my shoes at home. - Fell asleep at Pizza Hut after the state road race ... got a face full of tomato sauce. - Was best man at a friend's wedding ... his only demand was that we go for a ride that morning ... I lost him ... bride asking " WHERE'S PAUL ?? ! :eek: " ... uh, I dunno. :( He showed up 30 minutes later. :p jw |
Last spring, after five years of inactivity due to back problems, I started riding again. After a few weeks, I decided to head out on the local group ride. I went out with the 'Slow B' group - which is several clicks down from the AA guys who I generally ride with now. This is middle aged fat guys, women, essentially a major fredfest. Very nice people, nice ride, etc. Now remember I'm a former hard core racing guy (like every weekend for a decade) who routinely averaged 7K miles annually, yada yada.
So my MIND thinks I'm still like that. But my overweight (at that point I was 5'11", 190+ lbs) body belied that fantasy. So on the first climb (a moderate 3/4 mile affair with a couple of 10%+ upgrade spots) I get dropped by EVERYBODY. Old guys, fat guys, middle aged women, you name it. Man it was the loudest wakeup call I ever got. I knew it was coming - but the degree to which my cycling mojo was diminished was rather stunning to me. That was 9000 miles/9 mos. ago. I'm 90% of the way back. I wound up with a similar group (sort of by accident) in December and dropped the entire group on the same climb by 150+ yds. So it's coming back. But I won't forget that day. EVER. At the time it didn't really bother me. I was happy to be riding ANYWHERE with ANYONE on ANY LEVEL. Still am. |
Originally Posted by chroot
Let's see...
I've fallen about eight times myself on clipless, and have done plenty of stupid things. Let's recap: - I fell after three minutes of clipless use in a parking lot in front of my girlfriend. - I almost fell two minutes later (the gf was still watching), and actually broke the cleat. - I fell once because I neglected to unclip both feet when turning the bike around 180 degrees. A nice patch of bramble bushes broke my fall. - I fell once because I was in much too high a gear to begin moving up a hill. - I fell once waiting for a car to pass, after the driver tried to be "nice" by giving me the inappropriate right-of-way. - I end up in my granny gear at least once on almost every ride that's not board-flat. - I have found myself wishing for gears lower than 30/25 literally dozens of times. - I hit my max heart rate within three minutes of my most recent liesurely group ride. - I couldn't fight the wind on the Golden Gate Bridge one morning and ended up getting pushed into the railing. - My helmet (Giro Pneumo) makes my head look like a mushroom. My girlfriend is happy to point this out routinely. - I always have the whitest little chicken legs of anyone in every group ride I've done to date. - I almost cried when I fell on someone's driveway at 0 mph and my brifter got rotated out of line. I thought I had ruined my bike. When I got home, I finally realized you can just push them back. - I'm absolutely terrified of going through the rows of concrete poles that block cars from entering bike paths. - I got stuck at a protected left turn light for almost ten minutes one time because I could not figure out how to trigger the light, or what else to do. - I took a quick look at someone else's bike and thought for a minute or two that he was riding a bike called a Bento Box. I complimented him on a nice looking Bento Box. He was puzzled. - Warren i know what you mean! |
Originally Posted by Blackberry
Oh, yeah. I brought a brand new bike. Took the front wheel off. Put the bike in my car. Left the front wheel on the ground. Then backed up. As soon as I heard the sickening crunch, I knew I would have to go back in the shop and order a brand new wheel. Boy did I feel like a Yahoo.
jw |
Sometimes its fun to bring back the old stuff isn't it :D ?
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:D man, this is a funny thread... I guess I find it funny b/c a lot of this has happened to me.
*just got my first road bike about a week after christmas... I was in there getting fitted and the guy says "ok, get on the bike and pedal while shifting thru the gears". I'm thinking ok... not a big deal... start pedaling and realize I don't know how to shift both ways. didn't know there was a little shifter for the thumb. he kinda laughed when I asked how to shift. I felt like a goofball.... and then trying to get the front wheel off was another story... :D |
When I was young I had a bike with a front carrier (Moulton Deluxe). Riding into the wind, head down, I rode into a parked car and ended up on the bonnet (hood). The carrier went straight into the radiator, and as a neighbour pulled me off there was a nice trickle of green water coming from the car.
I once bonked so badly that a five year old on a tiny bike out with his mum decided to race me and there was nothing I could do about it. Last year in Chamonix I had just descended a very steep and long trail, hopped off at the bottom, looked back up the hill for my g/f, stepped back and put my leg on the red hot rear disc. I swear it went Hiss as it branded a nice little crescent mark in me. She laughed as I was hopping around. We are no longer together. |
At the start of the 2006 Toronto Ride for Heart I was so pumped for the start of the 75K that I clipped my feet in and started off with a great hammering cadence.....only to find after about 100m that the entire mass of cyclists (this is the start remember, around 10,000 bikes!) stopped due to a bottleneck in the way. You guessed it, I failed to execute the unclip and toppled over nearly causing a 10,000 person domino unclip topple over. Do I win for having the most witnesses??
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sorry 2005, although I'll probably do it again!
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Originally Posted by uxrider
sorry 2005, although I'll probably do it again!
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Originally Posted by Wheels4
:D man, this is a funny thread... I guess I find it funny b/c a lot of this has happened to me.
Cheers, Brian |
my huffy road bike has seen better days...
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- got dropped on a "social ride" by three obviously overweight middle aged ladies who I was certain would never finish the ride
- after same "social ride" nearly passed out in front of the group from failing to hydrate properly in 90 deg weather - ended up on my a$$ on scorching hot pavement unable to stand... - fell off and then onto my bike in a parking lot in front of dozens of riders when my leg cramped as soon as I got it on the ground at the end of a training ride... many more to come I'm sure... :) |
I used to star in a TV show with a talking car. That was pretty humbling.
Some other actors used to co-star in a TV show with me. That was pretty humbling for them. |
Let's see....
I've fallen twice due to not unclipping....once on the road and onto a nice soft patch of grass on a busy road (yeah, that was embarassing), and another time in my bedroom while fine-tuning my seat adjustments (I didn't have a trainer at the time). After years off the bike, my first ride back on the bike consisted of 1 mile climb with a max grade of 17% up near the top. Yeah, that turned into a very short ride. I did, however make it within about 70 yards from the top of the hill. Even though I didn't have a HRM at the time, I do believe I came very close to hitting my MHR on that one, if I didn't in fact do so. I'll still use that hill to gauge my fitness. Going for mountain bike rides with my gf's brother was always a very humbling experience, since I suck at mtn. biking and he flat out flys through anything. I guess him going every day kinda helped his handling skills as well. |
Since I have not yet taken out my new road bike, everything has happened on my mtn bike:
Had the usual clipless accidents fortunately never in front of a crowd. Going up a small hill right in front of my house I was shifting gears and the chain didnt engage. I got caught free spinning with no tension and I came to an unexpected dead stop. Over I went. On a trail I was transitioning from a concrete bridge to a dirt trail and I couldnt unclip. Over I went onto a pile of jagged rocks. Had pain in my left forearm for 4 weeks! My own dog ran me off my own driveway and into my mailbox. I have now learned to slow down FAR ahead of any intersections and unclip about 50 yards before I get there. Scared to death of excessive speed down hills. I'll always slow down...better safe than sorry. I'm sure my road bike will bring some new experiences!! |
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