bowzette

Never stop pedaling. But the bike is fine

AlmostTrick

The rest of the story, please.

TejanoTrackie 

Hey old man, hope you aren't too badly banged up. Get well soon.

bowzette

Wellll if you insists. Total Operator Error and Brain Fade. I've been riding FG a lot the past 4 years-longer to long road rides and 4 centuries. I live in the land of rollers. A week ago Saturday I rode 70 miles through these rollers. The point is I'm not new at this-long road rides through hills and rollers.
Excuses or Analysis:
1. Except for the long Saturday ride a week ago I haven't ridden the FG much or at all.
2. I was tired from the long prior Saturday ride and hard geared intervals Thursday evening.
3.I wasn't paying attention and realized I was going way faster than I could control or at least control that day-legs weren't up to it. I can spin 130-140 maybe 150 rpms (only a couple of times at 150.
4. I don't know if I put the brakes on too hard and then tried to coast or forgot the FG isssue and hesitated locked up the rear wheel and then tried braking. At any rate I fished tailed left, then right. i thought I had it under control but fishtailed again big time. Bike went sideways and I flipped over the bars. Cars stopped to help me and gave and bike a ride home. Then off to the ER for stitches in elbow. I tucked and didn't hit my head. Just road rash-not much-raspberry on hip, lot of damage to skin on elbow and the most painful is I pulled or tore muscle in my chest. So I'm lucky, no serious damage. I'm still trying to determine how I let this happen. I think not riding FG much the past three weeks and being tired were the primary causes.

bowzette

Thanks TT. I will be fine. When going over the bars my thought was "hope the cars behind me don't run over me. They didn't but stopped and helped. I'm out of town but will ride the trainer Tuesday. I can ride on the road if it doesn't hurt the chest muscle or i can avoid standing. Clearly a poster child example of rectum-cranium insertion Wife and biking buddies will give me grief about "old man riding fixed gear". The Old get no respect-unless you beat them to the top of the hill.

jlafitte 

Speedy recovery, man.

Bandera

Speedy recovery!

-Bandera

habilis

One old guy to another - hope you feel better soon. Let's face it, it always takes some luck to get to the bottom of a steep hill at 40mph in one piece, and yet we all keep at it. I recently hit a minor hiccup on a downhill. Hardly felt it, yet it gave me a pinch flat. I didn't even know I had a flat till I reached the bottom of the hill and felt the wheel rumbling. That could easily have been a whole different story.

hairnet

Pedal faster than the pedals.

AlmostTrick

Thanks for posting the unfortunate details. Sorry you took a spill, but glad you weren't hurt worse. Pedal On!

Leukybear 

Heal up!

A good trick if you're riding too fast (downhill) to lock up your rear wheel into a skid is to bunnyhop the rear wheel in succession before doing so.

bowzette

thanks guys. I hope to ride the FG on the road this week-"get back on the horse" concept By this afternoon I've been feeling a lot better. Spent most of the day resting and sleeping.

EasternRoads

Glad you didn't get too hurt, man. In June, I lost control going downhill at over 40mph. I dislocated my hip, I broke four vertebrae, and destroyed my clavicle. There is nothing to do but recover and get back on. Heal up fast and don't push it if you're not at 100% both physically and mentally.

Trakhak

I always think of it as pedaling very flat ovals (as opposed to "pedaling in circles"), but "Pedal faster than the pedals" works, too.

bowzette

Well the plot thickens! I downloaded the ride from my Garmin. I was only going 25.5 mph which I think is 125 rpm looking at the Walbi calculator. I've ridden downhill at 125-135 a number of times. Something or some reason I loss concentration and hesitated pedaling. I haven't the least idea why. Note to self "Self Pedal faster than the pedals". Following Jon V. perhaps I should paint this on my top tube.

TejanoTrackie 

Well, the brain can play tricks on you, but my habit it to keep my hand on the front brake lever when doing fast or steep descents when I might rev higher than I want to. My threshold is 160+ rpm for extended periods of time, but can handle over 200 rpm for five seconds or so. I never try to relax or slow down my leg speed once my cadence gets over 160+ rpm, but will instead maintain some pressure on the pedals and use the brake to bring me back down to a manegeable cadence. Otherwise, I start bouncing on the saddle and the bike/rider assembly becomes a progressively unstable bio-mechanical system.