I was out on one of my usual rides. As I rode over a little bridge, I reached for my water bottle. As I took it out of the cage, I dropped it. I looked back on the road and it was gone in 2 seconds. It had rolled of the bridge, into the water and floated away. Water bottles are cheap, but this was the first one I had ever "earned" on a ride.

Oh! ...... so then you have met the knave too?

I wonder who he borrowed the kid from?

Geez, what a bunch of wusses! I for one have never unintentionally fallen on or off my bike. I have never seen a hill that I couldn't walk. And as for being passed by a women! I passed one just today like she was standing still. Of course I felt kind of bad about hooking her walker, but it was one of those kind with wheels on it so what can you do?

this, of course, begs the question... how often have you intentionally fallen on or off your bike.

tryed to squeeze through a too small gap in traffic between the curb & a school bus ,fell slowly on my side still clipped in, onto the sidewalk ,much to the amusment of the school kid passengers, it made their day!

Falling on, more than once. However, you know how it is, d--m bike gets uppitity and you just have to teach it a lesson. It tries fighting back but I'm just to strong.
Falling off, more than once. This happens when the bike wishes to go in a direction I don't. I just say the heck with it and fall off. Let the thing find its own way home! What really ticks me off is that it ususallly beats me there.

I fell twice on Saturday... The first time ever outside in clipless pedals. Nothing better than falling down at a complete standstill....

Good stuff. My most embarassing moment was on a beach cruiser. Some kids had a small ramp built up for skateboarding. I saw it and yelled to my girlfriend, "hey, watch this". I sprinted up to speed and hit the ramp. But in a split second I realized this ain't going to work and decided to bail the jump. I've done this kind of thing a thousand times on my good mountain bike clipped in, but, wearing sandals on a big, heavy beach cruiser, just isn't the same. I couldn't get out. I got hung up and crashed really hard. I mean really hard. It was pretty bloody and bad. But nothing lasting. Glad everyone got a good laugh though.

Great stories!

Here's my contribution...

Last year I'd just gotten this old (probably older than I am) bike from goodwill as a "project" bike and was taking it out for a ride on a bike trail after rendering it usable. Half way up a fairly steep hill I meet this guy, probalby about 70, coming down the hill, sweating and huffing like anything. I continue on my way, not thinking much of it, but I'm sure feeling my own ego inflating a bit ("stop that! that's not nice, he's an old guy!"), when near the top of the hill he overtakes me. (I'm pretty sure he reached the bottom before turning around). He proceeds to stay far enough ahead of me that I thought he'd completely dropped me, but on the rare straight stretches I could see him in the distance.
I eventually cought up, only to hit a rediculously steep section of the trail and have him blow by me, never to be seen again.
and the worst part? He was jogging!

Pulled up to intersection, and since I cannot track stand I thought I'd be slick and unclip my left foot and rest it on the guard rail which looked pretty sturdy. It's always at these times that you forget the soles of the road shoes are hard plastic and have very little grip on shiny steel. Foot slipped, missed the guard rail with the hand but managed to catch it with the armpit.

Still working on the track standing, but am not working on the rail standing anymore.

VW

Oh boy here I go:

I fell over twice in clipless
- once while talking to my wife, she was in our car and met me at a store, I pulled up
to the drivers side, tried to grab ahold of the door frame and sloooowly fell over .
She tried to catch me but was laughing too hard.
- second one was at a light, female jogger watched me slooowly fall over to the side
I didn't clip out fast enough at the light. I DO NOT try to track stand...ever.

Because I was too cheap to buy a set of panniers I strapped a backpack to the top of my rear rack. Thing came undone, caught up in the back wheel while I was doing 30kph, I skidded for a good 100 feet.
I now have panniers.

Quite a few years ago, when I got a bike with a front QR I was riding along and said to myself "Gee that QR looks loose" so I pull up on my front handle bars to check.....yup, it was loose.

Eating an apple while riding, one hand on the apple, one on the handlebar, bike hits a small crack in the road, wobbles to the right, hits the gravel shoulder that just had new gravel added and was soft, front tire digs in....over I go. Never found the apple...
Sucks too, it was a 'honey snap', damn tasty.

Flipped over the handlebars on my MTB bike, going downhill, used the front brake too much.

That's about it, so far.

We're everywhere! I'm so relieved!

Hearing everyone's "how I learned clipless" stories, I decided to learn them in a big grass field behind a church. I'd get one foot in and fall, I'd get up, put in the foot and fall. I didn't even get moving before falling. I'd go a foot, try to clip the other in, and fall. Stopping was a whole 'nother series of falling. It took about an hour and a half before I graduated from the grass field to the parking lot. I was covered in grass stains but it turns out that the whole apartment complex just beyond the grass was peaking through their windows looking at the fool who couldn't ride a two-wheeler for his life.

At the Tour Du Port in Baltimore last summer I made it to the halfway point in the park where there was a mechanic setup. My trigger shifting was a little iffy so they cleaned it out. The first half mile out of the park was a run through a neighborhood ... being excited to test my shifting I blasted by the first group of rec riders. About two blocks down a SUV comes barrelling down the corner with me at a full speed ... I hit all the brakes, flip over the bars, clipped in taking the bike with me in a 180. About a minute later the rec pack I passed goes rolling by ...

Last weekend I was returning to my bike shop to get a fitting on my new bike. They convinced me to switch to Speedplay X's pedals, which have so much float that I was having trouble clipping out of them. This really hot woman is standing right outside the shop with a tight green top because of St. Patrick's day. I try to stop, unclip successfully, and then almost do an end over trying to get my other foot out of the pedal ... crap. Walked into the shop, got enough looks and laughs to last the fitting.

Hilarious thread. Love it. I am one that never takes myself too seriously.

I've had some good ones over the years of my cycling:

-First time on clipless pedals, high school, Look ATB pedals, and I didn't know what the hell this tension adjustment is. Well the pedals come from the factory nearly fully tensioned. Got out, clipped in. Rode around the driveway... came to a stop aaaand slowly fell over. When I tried to unclip on the ground, the pedals were so tight, the cleat turned on the bottom of the shoe. I ended up having to unlace the shoes. My old man thought all this was pretty hysterical.

-Once on our annual mtb trip to Killington, VT, we came to a stop on a trail to wait for slower riders. I have a habit of not unclipping when a tree is handy to lean on. I put my arm out, while looking at my buddy, trying to be all smooth. Well, my hand missed the tree by a good foot and over I went.

-In that same vein I remember a time coming to a stop on a trail when the tree I selected to hang on to was a little too young to suppor my weight. Over I went with the tree. Upon hitting the ground, the tree catapulted my bike back up and over. That was a proud moment.

-When I was younger (middle school?) I was riding around on my slick new Huffy. I low flying (and I mean low, probably less than 1,000 feet) C-130 heading into Westover flew right over my house. I looked up to see it, lost my balance, feel over and spraigned my wrist.

-Later in high school, the very first ride of our newly formed mountain bike club, it was raining but I was so eager to show off my mad skillz to my friends. We weren't even at the trailhead and I watched my buddy hop a big white pine root and tweak his bars. I attempted to do the same thing but managed to aim right for another tree upon landing. It was that day I found out what exactly tacoing a wheel was.

-And possibly the dumbest... backed into my garage with my bike on my roof rack. This was after not five minutes before exiting my car to get my mail at the end of my driveway and thinking "better remember not to back into my garage today!" Amazingly no damage to the bike or the rack. $1000 worth of damage to my roof. Brilliant.

I have others, I'm sure I'll think of them.

Great thread. I pulled up next to a buddy and his wife in their mini-van to say hi. I unclipped on the right and fell to the left. His wife was afraid he had hit me.

Another time I pulled up to a stop light and didn't get unclipped and fell over. I picked myself up just in time to hear the guy in the truck turning left yell "I didn't see a thing"

A couple of my favorites....

First one was many years ago, relatively new at mt. biking - riding on a cold, wet and muddy day. Near the end of the ride I come to big mud pit. As I approach the pit, someone is coming directly at me from the other direction. So rather than both of us going through the pit at the same time, I skirt it to the side and stop to see how he does. I don't clip out - there's a nice sapling there to grab onto. Problem is, the ground was so wet that I pulled the sapling out of the ground as I slowly fall into the mud pit. Of course my buddies were there to witness the fall, I was covered in wet mud head to foot. Did I say it was a cold day? Luckily we had my friend's beatup van so I didn't have to ride outside on the roof racks.

This one is more recent. Here in the DC area we had a mild December & January. A few days after a small snowfall the temp was up to 45 or 50 so I took a Saturday ride in Rock Creek. For those familar, near the bottom of the blocked off section, I turned right and went up Ridge Road and then onto Ross Drive. These roads are controlled by the US Park Service and after a snow, they close them off until things melt so on this day no cars and the roads were clear of snow. I was feeling pretty strong and these are good hills to climb so I'm trying to motor. Now there's a bridge on Ross Rd. that's a bit downhill and if you are doing any sort of speed, you need to bunny hop a gap. So I'm approaching the bridge feeling pretty good when I notice a couple of females walking their bikes on the bridge. OK, it's clear, they are too tired from the ride up, time to show them what a manly man I am so I pick up my speed even more. I do the bunny hop and land on the bridge. Well the bridge is one sheet of ice from end to end - something I would have noticed if I hadn't been looking at the ladies - I mean their bikes. So I hit the ice, knowing I was in deep s**t - whenever I've hit ice in the past I've gone down. But this time I manage to stay upright - but I am swearing uncontrollably as I pass the ladies. And somehow I make it - I don't know how. Of course there is a bunch of laughter from the onlookers - but I showed them my killer skilz.