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Trees are softer than roads.
The winter weather is here in the Northern climes and the early mornings are cold, clear and bright. An ideal time to go for a cycle in my opinion. Well it would be except for the ice on the roads.
Last week, the first of the hard frosts, I gave the slippery conditions no thought as I pulled out of the gate. It wasn’t until I tried to go around the first tight corner (on a downward slope) that the memories came rushing back to me at the same moment the asphalt slapped me around the face. The bike went across both lanes and I followed it on my side, stopping just before I hit the curb. Fortunately it was too early for there to be any cars around, so no squishy death ensued. As I got up I was laughing that much that I nearly fell over again.
Damage to both me and the bicycle was minimal; I had a few cuts on my left thigh and elbow and the chain had got jammed up. I fixed the latter and still grinning at the image of me and the bike skidding across the road, I set off again.
The next couple of turns were fine, then, as I rounded a junction, disaster struck again. Well, okay, maybe foolishness rather than disaster. I consider it a balancing of the scales, my right side was feeling left out of the beating. The couple of pedestrians didn’t seem to understand why I was laughing so much as I pulled myself up off the road for a second time. I tried to explain that I was quite used to the odd accident, but in the end had to settle for telling them I was unhurt.
Since then it’s not been as icy, and in the meantime I’ve been wonder if I should get some spikes for the tyres. (I’ll also take some pictures next time, or maybe get a helmet camera for action shots.)
The off-roading accident last weekend (see here) was no worse than any of my previous ones, but for some reason it made me nervous about doing other drops.
The Slope I Couldn't Jump
I’m a big believer in getting straight back on the bike again, no matter what the crash, and so I took it down to an area I’ve used many times and since left behind. (I was at the bottom of the slope I’d fallen down so it was easier to keep on going rather than drag the bike back up the bank.)
Oddly as I sat in the saddle looking down the drop I discovered I was nervous. I inched the bike down until I was just on the lip of the drop, but the more I thought about it the steeper it looked. I even tried to reason with myself, but courage failed me.
After pulling the bike away from the lip I decided to build up from something less troublesome. Three runs down some slightly shallower slopes and I was beginning to feel better about the whole thing, so I returned my previous position. This time I went over the edge without any problem. I did it a few more times just to be on the safe side and then took my sore body home.
I’m pretty sure that by next weekend I’ll be doing these runs without hesitation, but it was an odd feeling to experience fear.
Man meets tree: tree wins.
Well it had to happen. It’s been over a month since I had a good cycling accident and in the last few weeks I’ve been pushing my chances a bit. The off-roading runs I had been doing were of average length and incline, but had nothing to dangerous in them. Two weeks ago, however, I discovered a couple of new routes through the woods.
The Killer Tree
One was a fast downhill ride, using a track about half meter wide with some sharp turns in it and (in places) lose ground. The scary bit was the start, which is a slope of just over 45 degrees. This means the speed at the start is excellent, but it also means that the bike will still keep moving even with both breaks on.
The second course starts off with a shallow, but rather narrow, path that then opens up into a wide slope (about thirty meters across) littered with fallen trees. The aim is to get from the top to the bottom as fast as possible by picking the best route. The hazard here is that a lot of the logs are difficult to jump over and it is very likely that having cleared one they’ll be another immediately after, giving only seconds to make a turn.
The Path - Downhill
I suspected I’d crash doing the latter of these two, but as it turned out I lost control at the start of the first one after hitting a small root. This pushed me off course and I was unable to either slow the bike or point it away from a large pine tree. The result was me riding straight into the bottom section of the tree and being pushed off (rather than the controlled jump I would have liked) by the branches.
The damage wasn’t too severe: a couple of cuts on my face, some other scratches on my arms and some bruising on my legs. Nothing broken this time and far less blood. The adrenaline kick afterwards was fantastic.
The moral of the story is: kids, wear your helmet. Mine took a big knock which I suspect would have resulted in a gash to the head.
A few more pictures can be found on the Flickr.
While cycling through a park the other week I chanced upon a woman sat on a bench. A few steps away her toddling child stood on the path. As I approached I looked at the child, then at the mother: both were unmoving. Based on this information I adjusted my direction to give the child a wide berth.
Bike In Tree
When I was within a couple of meters of the two the mother glanced up. Her concern that her child (who was still perfectly happy stood on one side of the wide path) would throw himself under the speeding wheels of my bike was evident and so she sprung into action. The toddler, upon spying his parent heading for him, decided to make a game of it: he turned and ran across the path.
Bike and child were now coming together like magnets pulled by an unseen force. I applied the brakes and took a sharp turn onto the verge. The mother finally reached her errant son. Disaster was averted, a disaster that would never have been impending if the parent had not intervened.
Maybe it was a break, or at least more some serious damage than I originally thought.
Finger Not Bending
It’s been well over a month since I ramed my face into the ground while messing around on the bicycle (see here) and I thought everything was healed. At the time I did think I’d done something nasty to one of the fingers on my left hand, but the swelling went down within a week and although it ached I presumed that would vanish as well. Now I find I still can’t bend my finger all the way onto itself and the pain hasn’t gone away.
Surprisingly, given all the silly things I get up to, I’ve never broken a bone in my body so I have nothing to compare this to, but I’m guessing I just did a lot of damage rather than actually breaking the finger. Hopefully there’s still more healing to be done. I’ll certainly be a little anoyed if it continues to hurt for the next forty years.
After my small biking accident the other week (see here) I thought it would be interesting to make a brief note of how long it took my injuries to heal. The damage was as follows: one sprained finger, a sprained neck (whiplash), bottom lip cut on the inside, top lip cut on the outside, internal damage to my nose.
Cycling Crash
As expected most of the injured areas were swollen for a couple of days. Because some of this was my mouth eating, smiling and general facial expressions were rather difficult, but once this had died away only stretching my top lip was difficult.
The finger stayed swollen for just over a week although most of the pain had gone within five days. My neck was also healed by the end of the first week. Having said that it actually took a few days for the pain to start. Within five days my nose was also back to normal again.
All in all everything was in working order quicker than the cuts on my arm and leg took to heal following the accident the week before. Experience therefore shows that while it hurt rather a lot at the time, and for several days afterwards, there was nothing to worry about. Next time I’ll be more prepared for landing on my face and less fearful of the pain.
Some of my bits are now swollen. Let me explain why.
Mashed Face
Summer is here and this year I’m doing a lot more off-roading on the mountain bike. Doing stupid things inevitably leads to accidents and what better way to get over the pain than to show the world how stupid I am.
I’m really hoping that I improve my bike skills quickly and this new photo album won’t get that full, but who knows. As I said to a friend, taking care of myself has always been a problem; killing myself is proving more of a challenge. This is what happens when you push good sense and fear to one side:
What I find interesting is that this sort of incident doesn’t bother me at all. Rather than deter me it actually spurs me on to try harder. After accident two had happened I spent a few minutes on my hands and knees, waiting for my vision to clear and letting the blood cover the ground. Then I got up and checked if the bike was okay. My first thought after that was to wonder where I went wrong and how I could get it right next time.
Fortunately I wasn’t stupid enough to have another go straight away, but I was very eager to get back to practicing again. It’s not that I posses an urge for perfection or that I’m competitive, I just don’t understand why I can’t do what others can. I guess it comes down to confidence and my belief that most things can be achieved if you just keep trying and don’t fear failure. Here’s to many more years of finding challenges that nearly, but don’t actually, kill me.
