Best way to crash?

idkPhil

I crashed going downhill today, hit the pebble shoulder(whose idea was it to put a 4 inch deep pebble shoulder on the edges of a bike trail?) on a bike trail, front wheel dug in 4 inches or so and I was down and sliding. Ruined my new lycra shorts and got scraped up a bit.
when I crashed my hands came off the bars and I put my shoulder out into the ground first, and then just slid along the pavement.

After this I was thinking about how I could have crashed to minimize damage to my shorts, bike, and body.

So road beginner forum, how would you go down in a crash, is there an ideal way to crash?

ilm_zero7

fall into water or onto another cyclist - preferably female with air bags and you will damage your clothing less - at least in the initial fall!

Anonymous

Carry lots of marshmallows or flumps as energy food/crash pads. Or, alternatively, just roll.

Variado

Not sure i've ever had long enough to think about it..!

softlad

idkPhil wrote:

So road beginner forum, how would you go down in a crash, is there an ideal way to crash?

never crash unless you are in long grass, or close to a hospital A&E dept. Stay upright at all other times.....

ride_whenever

you're wearing lycra and crashing onto tarmac and gravel...

there really is very little you can do to help other than stay loose and roll as much as you can rather than sliding.

Learning to mtb really help as you end up with vastly better bike handling skills.

Lillywhite

ride_whenever wrote:

Learning to mtb really help as you end up with vastly better bike handling skills.

Although road bikes aren't fitted with disc brakes so feathering of brakes is essential.

Bobbinogs

There was a featurein C+ (and also the BikeRadar pages) on how to come off your bike. I read it a few times but found that, when I did get knocked off my bike shortly afterwards, I didn't get a chance to try all the techniques (except for gracefully unclipping whilst flying through the air).

I like the flumps idea but not sure about sticking them down my shorts :shock:

ex-pat scot

Shoulder, elbow and hip to hit the deck
Don't put your arm out to arrest your fall- you'll break your collarbone.

Keep hold of the bars.

Pick yourself up quickly in case you get run over...

clanton

What I do is hit the ground hard. When I stop sliding or rolling I get out of the road as quickly as I can manage to stop getting run over.

glauciaregina9

The best way to crash is, do it when nobody's around to see it, then you don't have witnesses to you looking like a berk

ride_whenever

Lillywhite wrote:

ride_whenever wrote:

Learning to mtb really help as you end up with vastly better bike handling skills.

Although road bikes aren't fitted with disc brakes so feathering of brakes is essential.

Offroad you rarely have reliable traction so feathering is just as important. You get a lot more competent as sticking the bike sideways, saved me from numerous roadie crashes as i'm relatively happy drifting my road bike round gravel turns if it does start to slide unexpectedly. The reflexes just kick in, you don't have that moment of ohshitohshitohshit where you lock up and fall off, you relax and go with it much better.

Limburger

Into a pillow factory, or perhaps a bouncy castle!

Dr S

Before you hit the ground, if its getting squirrelly ease off the brakes and try and keep your weight somewhere round central, most of the time the bike will roll over a multiitude of sins. Imagine if you only had a hand on the saddle and we're pushing what would happen. It would probably bounce a little and roll onwards. Try not to disrupt this process!

When its definitly going south..

Roll when you hit the ground and try to give the bike a push off when you are taking an unscheduled dismount. Nothing worse than being hit by your own bike just as you start to sit up again..

Nick

Rouge Penguin

Unclip, leaping Dettori from the saddle, landing on the balls of my feet as i slide to a standstill in a Neo/Matrix entrance hall scene style.

Or when i did actually get tagged by a wanker not paying attention, slide along the ground not realising what had happened and thanking the lord for the light drizzle that had reduced the friction on the tarmac.

daviesee

Somersault over the bars, come to a sliding stop on your cleats and yell Ta Da! :P

Reality is very different in my experience.
I did once manage a full somersault onto my butt still holding a full cup of coffee though when I hit a pothole with my hand on the front brake 8)
I can't really take the credit for skillz though :oops:

The tip about not sticking your arm out is true but hard to resist.

racingcondor

Assuming there aren't any giant marsmallows to fall into there's really not a lot you can do except try not to put your hand out. Two crash stories from me -

1) Where a pedestrian stept out from behind a bus without looking (nothing you can do from 3 feet away) and took me down. I managed to throw the bars far enough over to get them past him but couldn't change my momentum in time and went into him head first. Landed straight armed and although I didn't break anything I couldn't lift my hand above my waist for 2 weeks thanks to all the muscle damage. That was at about 10 mph.

2) In my youth I had a beat up mountain bike which I rode (and maintained) as badly as you'd expect a teenager to. The best crash though was from me sprinting around some walkers (country roads, no pavement) when the chain skipped. I lost my footing and ended up right foot on the ground standing on the other pedal, right pedal jammed up behind my knee and starts throwing me forward so I ended up hurdling the handlebars and landing running down the road as the bike did an endo. I couldn't quite believe my luck after I realised what happened, not sure that the walkers could either...

Given the choice, the best way to crash is definitely number 2 .

cooldad

When I was a young lad at school (ala quill pens and flogging) we once had a bike safety talk.
All I ever remembered was that he said that as he rode, he would think of what could happen and plan how to roll, until it became instinctive.
Seemed like a good idea, if a bit paranoid, so that's what I've tried to do.
Tuck in and roll.
Hasn't stopped me getting hurt regularly though.
So probably useless advice.

MichaelW

ex-pat scot wrote:

Shoulder, elbow and hip to hit the deck
Don't put your arm out to arrest your fall- you'll break your collarbone.

Keep hold of the bars.

Pick yourself up quickly in case you get run over...

I seond this proposal
Also keep an eye on your runout line. Its easier if you have a gradual reduction in speed, eg crashing downhill or into a hedge. A sudden deceleration , eg hitting a tree will cause more harm.

Develop an eye for terrain and you will reduce your crash-rate.
Wear gloves. Road rash to arms and legs is a bit painfull. Road rash to your hands is a very different story.

rick_chasey

A few French cycling coaches have been moaning that current day pros/amateurs haven't learnt how to fall off their bikes properly, so that when there is a big crash in the peleton, more people come off seriously hurt than others than they used to. So there's probably some truth in the notion of a better way to fall off your bike.

idkPhil

MichaelW wrote:

Wear gloves. Road rash to arms and legs is a bit painfull. Road rash to your hands is a very different story.

Yeah I wasn't wearing gloves when it happened, lost a bit of skin on my left hand, made riding home a bit uncomfortable.

I'll have to look for pillow factories or female cyclists with air bags next time I have a crash.

Unfortunately people were around to see when I crashed.. it seemed like they are always around when you do something embarrassing (like your first day riding clipless.)

softlad

idkPhil wrote:

Unfortunately people were around to see when I crashed.. it seemed like they are always around when you do something embarrassing (like your first day riding clipless.)

that's a good thing - you don't want to be crashing when there's nobody about, you might need some help...