ever done something cool on a bike... by accident?

oblongomaculatus

I've never tried to bunny-hop, can't be bothered to track stand at traffic lights, but I did do this a while back:

Approaching a crossroads, I want to turn right. My attention taken by traffic from behind, oncoming and by the lights, I fail to notice a metal utility cover on my line. The road is slightly damp. As I turn right, the rear wheel loses traction on the metal, causing the bike to swing round rapidly, and then stop leaving me pointing in the direction I wanted to go. Not pausing I rode on, wondering if anyone who saw thought I'd done it on purpose.

chris_bass

oblongomaculatus wrote:

Not pausing I rode on, wondering if anyone who saw thought I'd done it on purpose.

In my experience no one ever sees stuff like that. If I have a clipless moment (at the risk of tempting fate not had one for a couple of years now!) it is in full view of a bus load of children all pointing and laughing. If i trip up there will be the pretty girl i have been trying to impress laughing at me.

Having said that, I did once get (kind of gently) hit by a car that slowed very suddenly and turned left in front of me and i managed to turn with it, lean into the car's passenger side as he stopped and managed to carry on cycling. All the time remaining clipped in!

I'm pretty sure he noticed that one as I cycled off I let them know i wasn't best pleased.

morstar

First club ride I ever went on at the grand old age of around 40.
Been cycling on and off my whole life and consider myself a competent but unexceptional bike handler but never ridden with a club until this day.

Riding down a narrow lane and I'm on the right hand side of the lane (as we seem to be using the entire lane). Someone ahead shouts that there is another club coming towards us. I made a bit of a sudden turn to the left side and lost my back wheel on gravel in the centre of the lane. 100% am going to hit the floor when my pedal makes contact at the bottom of the stroke and I drift sideways standing on my pedal as it scrapes along the ground for I'd guess a metre or so before my corrective steering took hold and I returned to upright and just rode on. This is all at probably mid teens mph.

Went from bit of a clown to awesome bike handler in a split second. There was probably a small element of good balance in there but it was far more down to luck than anything else.

chris_bass

Actually, whilst not anything to do with cycling, I did once make a 7-10 split in bowling, one pin bounced off the back of the alley and hit the other. There was a group of bowlers with their team shirts and own bowling balls a couple of lanes down and they all clapped. I go bowling about once every 2 years so was 100% luck but still gave me a bit of a swagger as I walked back to the seats.

homers_double

Slightly the opposite but I can, or could endo my MTB pretty well back in the day, we called up a mates local sailing club and in front of a load of people I endo'd to a stop. Unfortunatly it was on the boat launch which was on an incline towards the harbour.

I went straight over the bars and got a bit wet...

oblongomaculatus

Chris Bass wrote:

If I have a clipless moment (at the risk of tempting fate not had one for a couple of years now!) it is in full view of a bus load of children all pointing and laughing.

I think I've been luckier than you there. I've only done the clipless thing four times in total, but each time there was absolutely no-one else about. (It still hurt, though). I did see someone else do it at some lights recently, which made me appreciate this fact all the more (while trying not to laugh).

And yes, I do suspect that despite there being loads of cars and pedestrians around when I did my sharp right, no-one actually noticed.

bikes`n`guns

A girl ran across the road in front of me while I was hammering down a hill and I pulled a 40mtr endo to try and not run her over,, that was cool. The skid marks weren`t so cool though.

ddraver

It's common for wide bike paths in NL that run alongside main roads to divert around the inside of Petrol stations so that bike don't need to cross the forecourt.

One day I'm flying back home after a short blast with a massive tail wind as is common in the flat lands. I'm going 40ish kph. I make the turn to the right ok but am now totally off line to drift left back alongside the road. I can do very little but hold on and hope. As it happens I lose the back wheel on the apex then slide sideways until both wheels hit the outside kerb. The bike (not me) uses this as a handy berm and i flick back straight and upright and stamp on the pedals into the sunset

norvernrob

A few weeks ago I was riding down my road, and by riding I mean out of the saddle sprinting at around 30mph as my road is a 1 mile downhill which then flattens out for around 300m before I get home. The driver in the car I was following suddenly decided there wasn't enough room to pass between parked cars and a bus coming the other way (there was plenty).

He slammed the brakes on and instinctively I grabbed two handfuls, the back wheel locked and slid right round until I was almost going sideways. At that point I controlled it and straightened up, probably more out of luck than anything else.

I used to do that kind of thing on gravel paths at 10mph on an MTB when I was a kid, I didn't expect to be doing it at 30mph on a main road

MisterMuncher

Due to lack of thought, I once cut the cable outer a little short for the rear brake, such that a sharp turn right (?) could tighten the cable enough to apply the brake. I found this out when...

I was coming down a local mountain that has a tricky little chicane/s bend that really needs to be taken at less than 20mph, but was clearly running too hot. I got around the initial left somehow and swung hard to the right, fully ready to end up in the verge, when the rear locks up, and the bike executes the neatest drift imaginable. Note that this is the bike, my input solely being that of a ten-thumbed monkey.

Cue chat about silky descending skills all the way to the cafe. I fixed the brake that evening.

morstar

OK, there's nothing cool about the at all but this thread is a bit cathartic.
Riding my road bike with tri bars into Nottingham city centre. Short ride, young and exuberant ( a few years ago), balls out efforts between lights keeping up with traffic.
For some reason I decided from far too far away I was going to make a set of lights changing against me. The box van in front decided otherwise. Lots of rubber left on the road and some brown marks in my shorts as I twatted the back of the van which forced my tri bars upwards where they hit me firmly on the nose.
Pride the only damage which was probably a healthier outcome than if I had gone through the lights. I guess that is pretty cool really.

bompington

Once startled an early morning dog walker when descending a long hill on my way to work. 35ish mph on a wet road when I clipped the "seam" in the surface at the centre of the road and the bike went very sideways. Somehow stayed upright and just carried on, but my involuntary exclamation, rather than the appearance or sound of the skid, made said dog walker jump a mile!