Well, that was embarassing...
35dollars
Posts: 832 Member
The place to post all the dopey things you've done on a bike
To start the ball rolling, my ride this evening:
Coming home in a short-sleeved shirt, I was getting pretty chilly, so when I stopped at traffic lights which I know have a really long phase, I thought it would be my chance to quickly get something warmer on. Quickly got off the bike, stripped off my shirt, grabbed the long-sleeve shirt out of my panniers, got that on, helmet back on, reclipped into my left pedal, all with seconds to spare before the lights changed.
Lights go green, I push off and swing my right leg up... at which point my left shoes slips off the pedal (don't know whether it hadn't clipped properly or indadvertently unclipped it), bike goes flying the other way... large cheer from one of the waiting cars at the circus performance in front of them.
I managed to avoid dropping the bike, but then continued to make an exhibition of myself by repeatedly failing to get safely clipped in as I pushed off, and wobbled all across the (very busy) junction with impatient motoring hordes queued up behind me, audibly rolling their eyes...
To start the ball rolling, my ride this evening:
Coming home in a short-sleeved shirt, I was getting pretty chilly, so when I stopped at traffic lights which I know have a really long phase, I thought it would be my chance to quickly get something warmer on. Quickly got off the bike, stripped off my shirt, grabbed the long-sleeve shirt out of my panniers, got that on, helmet back on, reclipped into my left pedal, all with seconds to spare before the lights changed.
Lights go green, I push off and swing my right leg up... at which point my left shoes slips off the pedal (don't know whether it hadn't clipped properly or indadvertently unclipped it), bike goes flying the other way... large cheer from one of the waiting cars at the circus performance in front of them.
I managed to avoid dropping the bike, but then continued to make an exhibition of myself by repeatedly failing to get safely clipped in as I pushed off, and wobbled all across the (very busy) junction with impatient motoring hordes queued up behind me, audibly rolling their eyes...
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My best one is probably an "incident" from a couple of years ago on the way home from a road ride. There's a busy 4 lane road that I had to make a quick left on before making another right back onto a smaller road. The stoplight before the left has a fairly steep uphill gradient where it meets the bigger road. I was sitting at the light, in the middle of the left turn lane, with cars behind and beside me. The light turned green, I stood up to sprint across the street, quickly clipped in with my other foot and... went nowhere but down.
Turns out I forgot down downshift a bunch of gears before stopping at the light, so I was WAY over-geared for getting moving on that hill from a stop. When I stood up and clipped in, I put all my weight on the forward pedal, the bike didn't move, and I tipped over in front of and beside a whole bunch of spectators.
I'm sure I got some eyes rolled at me as well.2 -
Mine occurred at a junction where the cycle path meets the road and someone in their wisdom has put in a (much too narrow) staggered barrier. For reasons that allude me, although my hands were on my handlebars, I was clearly cycling with my pinky fingers stuck out in the air. I managed to get my little finger caught in the barrier as I was cycling through and narrowly escaped coming off in the resultant wobble :-(1
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Sitting at a very busy intersection...first time for me at this particular light. Lots traffic coming off the freeway, lots gravel on pavement, not a lot of room for a bike. I'm stopped at the red light. Left foot on the ground, right foot clipped in. Who knows what happened, but I found myself falling over into the pavement flat out. Didn't hurt but boy I was embarrassed. Got up and dusted myself off. Light turned green.
This is a funny thread.
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Approaching a small village came across a traffic tailback to a traffic calming width restriction on my side of the road with a whole load of oncoming cars.
Rather than have a long wait decided a little bunny hop up a tiny kerb onto the empty pavement would get me to the clear road ahead without inconveniencing anyone.
Mistimed my hop and hit the kerb at a shallow angle, handlebars went to full lock and ejected me straight over the bars at some speed. Instantly everything went into slow motion, mind went back to my motorcycle racing experience and I talked myself through the accident....
"Don't stick out your hand, roll with the impact. Don't stick out your hand, roll with the impact....."
So of course I stuck out my hand and landed with all the grace of a sack of spuds. Right next to the open passenger window of the car I had been planning to pass.
Displaced collar bone, hip like a badly undercooked steak and hugely embarrassed.
The passenger did refrain from gloating at my impatience and seemed quite concerned that an elderly man should attempt to fly with so little success.1 -
Mistimed my hop and hit the kerb at a shallow angle
Been there, done that, though not with such catastrophic results. I was following another bike through the traffic a few weeks ago, and he (successfully) did the hop up thing (on his mountain bike, which may well be relevant) onto a low concrete platform in the middle of the road. I followed, got the angle horribly wrong and failed the jump, bouncing back into a series of uncontrolled weaves alongside the (fortunately stationary) traffic queue, accompanied by my arms and legs flailing all over the place. Fortunately, my "Mad Bike Skillz" (ho ho) were just about sufficient to keep myself upright and not crash into any of the cars.
Still not one of my more glorious moments though, and as it was happening I was certainly picturing the same sort of outcome that you unfortunately ended up with.1 -
best one I can remember (and prompted by seeing my local club's Hillclimb results on faceberk) was years ago now...
Final Competitive event of the road / TT season was always the club hillclimb. Brutally hard, short climb - https://www.strava.com/routes/6718352 - about 7% average, but it starts easy, then ramps up to a couple of 20% stretches - 1.1km, eyeballs out all the way.
I'd built myself something silly-light for the ride - fixed gear, no brakes, bullhorn bars, 24 spoke front, 28 spoke rear wheel, silk track tubs - the works. Even then, when I was around 78kg I needed every advantage I could get just to not turn in a completely laughable time...
So, came the dreaded time - i'd been on the rollers, warmed up, was all ready to go. Strapped in (yep - back in the era of toeclips & track-stylee double straps.) wasn't going anywhere.
Helper Supported me, got ready, 10 seconds...
5,4,3,2,1, Goooo....
Jumped forwards, every sinew straining like whipcord. Every Last Watt at my Disposal channelled into producing a bit of forward momentum and throwing myself up that hill...
Bang.
Chain broke.
My momentum carried be straight over the bullhorns and face planted me onto the tarmac.
Forehead, nose, chin looked like a shoulder of liver... road rash central.
Bikes still attached to me, 7 yards from the startline. Maybe 30 of my clubmates and their wives/girlfriends/hangers on all pissing themselves laughing. I can't get up because I can't get my feet out of the straps... When I was finally released, it became apparent that I'd hit the road with more than my face, as my new skinsuit had also hit the tarmac, ripped and basically pretty much evaporated around the hip and groin area.
Oh yes, that was an embarrasing one allright. Blood pouring down my face and my gentlemens vegetables proudly displayed and hanging in the breeze...
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I bet you didn't give a 5h1t about your gentleman vegetables at that point either; the least of your worries!1 -
I bet you didn't give a 5h1t about your gentleman vegetables at that point either; the least of your worries!
frankly, I was too busy checking that my Teeth were still in the right place to worry about my tackle waving in the breeze...
once I'd calmed down, I was just happy that for once I'd taken the van to the event, rather than riding out to the course, like I normally did on the "club ten's" etc... At least I had a towel, first aid kit (works van) and a change of clothes in the back...
No long term damage done, and hell, you've seen photo's of me, My Face isn't exactly my fortune anyway.
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Mine happened climbing a hill out of Loch Lomond about 8 years ago. It was my second day of biking with full packs after landing from America. I would spend five full weeks on that bike. Anyway, I was going up a long gravel hill very slowly. I was clipped in, and noticed a picture I wanted to take. As I braked, and tried to pull my foot out, the bike tipped over. I went head first into a peaty ditch. I sunk up to my waist. Fortunately, my helmet hit a rock just under the surface and kept my face mostly out of the muck. I pull myself up, being tankful there was nobody to see it. Just then, two women in a convertible came along side me laughing. They thought it was a good show. Covered in muck, I should have had them take a picture. I went on to have a great trip throughout Europe.2
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There was the one time I was going through a gate on a dirt road while mountain biking. The dirt road let up to the single track trail, so yeah, mountain biking dirt roads should be easy... But yeah, I clipped my handlebar on the gate, endoed down the embankment on the side of the road, landed on a baby tree that scrapped the crap out of my back, and tore my brand new jersey.1
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While biking in the city, my husband, who was following me on his bike did not notice I stopped for a stop sign and rode into me. We both tipped over onto our right sides into the street. He was shouting he thought, "He broke his leg". I helped him to the curb thankfully discovering he had not. While this was going on, several cars passed us. Not a single one asking if we were hurt or needed help. Upon getting home, I discovered I had torn my pants in the fall and was bleeding from the knee and right arm, where I scraped myself.1
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We all have more than one incident. While in a sprint triathlon, I transitioned to the biking segment, jumped on my bike and started out, only to discover that during the pre-race safety check, the inspectors had messed with my chain, and it fell off. I put it back on manually and continued the biking. Of course, during the race, a person wipes their nose, etc. Upon passing the finish line, one of the spectators handed me a napkin to wipe the chain grease off my face. Pretty. The moral of the story: do your own safety check AFTER theirs to fix anything they've screwed up.1
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Had one moment today. Got ready to ride my CX bike. Dressed and out the door. Went to clip in and realized I had on my 3 bolt road shoes. My CX bike has 2 bolt MTB pedals...1
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Had another one a few days ago. Coming into work, there's a temporary entrance where cyclists have to sort-of dismount for security and are then waved through an automatic gate.
I reached the gate, unclipped one foot and stood down on that side, got waved through, then as I re-clipped and mounted the bike move off, I managed to spear the rear of my leggings with the point of my saddle, pulling down the trousers and exposing half the grand canyon to the poor woman following me, and leaving me wobbling precariously all over the place until I managed to unhook myself and resume a more normal riding position.3 -
When bike shopping I decided to upgrade to clip in pedals. I was testing riding the bike in the parking lot of bike shop. Wasn't used to having to unclip and well just fell over sideways. The sales guy was pretty young and not sure what to do with me. I have since learned the art of unclipping.2
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Just found this thread - hilarious! My most recent story is from last Oct. I was riding down a busy residential street in sight of my car after a ride when my front wheel stopped dead for reasons I still can't explain. I didn't get my foot out of my left clip and of course that's the side I fell over on, right into traffic - fortunately there was a gap. So I'm lying there with the bike on top of me figuring I broke the entire left side of my body, and a group gathers around to help. One guy's directing traffic, a woman's calling 911, but no one wants to touch me to get the bike off so I can see how badly I'm hurt (a guy on a bike came by shortly and got my foot out of the clip). I'm mostly recovered from the fall, but I still get a flash of embarrassment every time I ride down that street.0
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When I was 11 (45+ years ago) I used to ride my bike to Soccer Saturday mornings.There was a driveway easement I crossed, which had a great piece of curved macadam, you could jump to get airborne, "lose your stomach" etc.
In the rashness of youth, I thought if I tried with my eyes closed, I would lose my stomach the better.
It took a bit longer than I thought, when I opened my eyes a telegraph pole was about 2" in front of them.
These days in Oz, we have mandatory helmets, I don't fight it.3 -
Something similar to the last one - I was 11 or 12, just tooling around on my bike, a few yards away from home. My mother was standing on the front path talking to a neighbour, and I thought I'd show of my "mad bike skillz" by heading at high speed towards the kerb and jumping the front wheel up and continuing on my majestic way.
The reality was slightly different, and involved a mistimed jump of the front wheel, that landed on the edge of the kerb rather than the top of it, which stopped the bike dead and sent me mostly over the handlebars, head-first into a concrete lamp-post. Fortunately, the lamp-post was undamaged in the collision.
Amazingly, I also came away largely unscathed, albeit with a bit less blood than I'd started the manoeuvre with.3 -
Scored another one, at the same junction that I started this thread with.
This time, the lights turned green, and I raced off to get across the junction ASAP before being enveloped by a herd of cars, pulling hard on the bars for extra leverage.... and managed to lift my front wheel about 18" in an unplanned wheelie.
All of which wouldn't have been too bad if I'd pulled it straight, but I pulled off-centre, causing my bike to lurch to the left, then back across my lane as I landed the wheel and over-compensated back to the right.
Fortunately, the car behind me had failed to get much of a getaway from the lights, so I was back a sensible line out of the junction by the time it caught up to me.1
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