Your worst bike accident

billyhead

Just curious what sort of accidents other posters had, what damage was done and how long were you recovering. I had my 3rd accident at the weekend gone. Came down as a result of black ice and suffered the usual skin burns, bruising, and a small cut but worst of all damaged some soft tissue according to the doctor in the area between the groin and the tailbone. Can hardly walk the last few days due to the pain from the tissue injury or lift my leg (No strength at all) and am on painkillers. The doc said to take it easy for the rest of the week. Cant see myself back on a bike for a while. Real pain in the arse and bored out of my tree lounging around at home:(

Indricotherium

The right hand side of my handlebars snapped off, while I was sprinting for a yellow light going by Hueston station from Islandbridge, I careened across the four lanes of traffic, narrowly missing going under a bus and over a couple of cars, hit the kerb on the other side and went over what was left of the handlebars and ended on the ground with my knees and shoulder torn open.

That's the worst I've had off a road bike.

buffalo

billyhead wrote: »

...damaged some soft tissue according to the doctor in the area between the groin and the tailbone... Real pain in the arse

It's good that you're able to make jokes about it!

billyhead

Indricotherium wrote: »

The right hand side of my handlebars snapped off, while I was sprinting for a yellow light going by Hueston station from Islandbridge, I careened across the four lanes of traffic, narrowly missing going under a bus and over a couple of cars, hit the kerb on the other side and went over what was left of the handlebars and ended on the ground with my knees and shoulder torn open.

That's the worst I've had off a road bike.

Ouch:eek: Sounds nasty. I presume you were layed low for a while after that

billyhead

buffalo wrote: »

It's good that you're able to make jokes about it!

Actually the arse is grand. Its in between that and my valuables were it hurts:)

triggermortis

Fell off my Chopper when I was 8 or 9 on loose gravel and ripped my knee to shreds. Regularly fall off the MTB but yet to come off the road bike in 18 months I've been on it

Jawgap

2 broken fingers.....

....23 stitches to my scalp....

....broken collarbone....

....bruising to my neck, back and legs.....


........by accident my wife opened the credit card statement and saw how much I'd spent on a new bike:D

On a more serious note, luckily / thankfully - road rash and the odd broken collarbone are the worst of my accidents.

john kinsella

Got hit by a car when the driver decided to pull out from being parked on the side of the road without any warning or indicating.

Ended up being thrown a few meters in the air and landing on my right wrist. Ended up being broken in 4 places.

To be fair the driver got out and was very apologetic etc and she was as shocked as I was.

As i couldnt think straight I said i was fine, picked up my wrecked bike and walked home.

When I went to hospital a few hours later the nurse called the Gardai as I was hit by a car. Apparently the driver also called them to let them know what happened (fair play to her)

Insurance got involved for bills etc and I got a few bob for pain and suffering £8000 punts as far as i remember. Wrist is still goosed though

Wishbone Ash

billyhead wrote: »

I had my 3rd accident at the weekend gone. Came down as a result of black ice(

Sorry to hear that billyhead. Get well soon. Was it in the Rush area?

As you know, I'm out at the moment with a broken collar bone and 2 broken ribs and torn muscles/ligaments. It's the worst I've had.

Beasty

Commuting into work a few years ago, hit a stone embedded in the hard shoulder when travelling at 40kph, went over the bars landing head first and scraped along the road a bit. All that's based on eye witness reports as I was concussed - can't remember anything until coming out of the hospital scanner a couple of hours later

Had a nasty gash aroiund the eye which needed a skin graft. Most of one cheek had bad roadrash, as did both forearms and a shoulder with a few other scrapes, but nothing broken. Spent 4 days in hospital.

Was back on the turbo 4 days after coming out of hospital. Recommenced commuting 3 weeks later and did the Tour de Kilkenny a week after that. I intended doing the full 160km, but ended up chickening out at the foodstop and only did the 107km or whatever it was.

Wibbs

Dislocated shoulder. Had to cycle to the A+E one armed with the other thankfully numbed but useless. Luckily I was up in the dublin mountains at the time so it was all downhill. Other than that general road rash has been the worst of it.

Gotham

I was coming down a very big hill road in the countryside, I was probably going near 50Mph and the bike went into a speed wobble.
I fell off during the wobble and slid on the tarmac and headfirst into the side of a stone bridge.
It was one of the only times I wore a helmet and it definitely saved my life - The helmet was shredded, massive melon-sized chunk taken out of it.
The bike was totally wrecked, wheel buckled- I picked it up, leant on it and used it as a crutch to walk a few miles home.
I haven't really cycled since.

dermo1990

On a spin last Saturday descending down Killiney Hill, a car appeared behind me and started moving closer and closer, effectively reducing my turning space to zero. So at one point I was turning and approaching an unfortunately placed ramp and knew I was going to crash, so I unclipped my left foot and pressed it against the wall so that i would end up going on my side instead of head first into a wall. That was my first crash that resulted in injury to both myself and the bike (about half an hour after the crash, heading toward greystones, the derailleur sheared off, chain broke and dented the seatstay).

My injuries are much milder compared to everything else here. I got away with a fairly bruised left shoulder that hurts anytime i use my left arm to scratch my back and some nasty bruising on my ass and legs. So for the next while I have to be rather careful about how I sit down...

seamus

A Tuesday morning. Beautiful crisp January's morning - negative degrees, a mist in the air, no wind and bits if crisp frost dotted around. It was a bit before I'd caught the cycling bug proper and I was hammering into work on my slick-tyred full-sus MTB. Doing about 23mph I go to transition from road to cycle track via a 45 degree kerb and for some bizarre reason I don't bother lifting my front wheel.

Wheel slips along the icy kerb, and I faceplant unceremoniously into the tarmac, biting through my lip. To add insult to injury, I jump back on the bike to go home and I get a puncture, having to walk the rest of the way with a face covered in road rash and a hole in my lower lip.

Crazy how bad these things look before they're fixed. Had five stitches in my lip and a face covered in road rash, both of which had pretty much disappeared within 7 days.

It's a fairly tame injury in comparison. I've had plenty of bruises and road rash otherwise.

Think_then_talk

A few years back I was on my way home from work & an other bike
crashed into me .I went over the handle bars onto the road.
The result was two broken wrists and my two little fingers.
I was in plaster casts for six weeks.The little fingers were never
the same especially when washing the face (in the eye or up the nose)
years on now feel a little pain in winter not much. The bike raleigh shopper.

droidus

I hate these threads.

RobertFoster

20 years ago last week my friend called around to get me to play football or something. One of us had the bright idea to swap bikes for the trip up the road. Having recently discovered that I could cycle with no hands on my own bike, I thought I'd give it a try on this foreign, bigger bike...

Queue me taking a header over the handle bars 100m from my house and landing on my teeth. I knocked out 3 of my upper incisors. Well, I say knocked out, my mother says they were pushed backwards into my mouth and hung by a thread. The tops were knocked off, either way, so they were broken. I didn't see them for myself, but I do remember my tongue touching them briefly and recoiling while on the way to the dentist.

The dentist, who I'm told has false teeth of his own, pushed the three stumps back into my gum and then put 3 caps on. They were my adult teeth (I lost my milk teeth after I fell in McDonalds a couple of years previous), so the caps have been replaced a few times, and I've had root canal work on them too.

It was just before Halloween, and my face was still swollen by the time it came to trick or treat. I dressed as Dracula and got a number of comments about how good my makeup was... but no, it was just my face. All my sweets were kept in a jar as I wasn't back on solids yet. I couldn't talk properly for a while either. First day back in school after the mid term the teacher had me stand and read in front of the class before she noticed (I think my Joseph Merrick impression that tipped her off). My parents were even called in to account for my injuries (the monsters!).

I just realised that it's been over 20 years since I've bitten into an apple like a normal person, and now I feel sad

portron niner

Coming home from work on my MTB , car in front of me was turning right into a carpark. I decided to bunnyhop up onto the path to go around him & spazzed the whole manouever. Front wheel hit the kerb, I went down on my shoulder & took a skelp out of the ball joint. Didn't hurt at all until I was in my old man's car on the way to the hospital. It's amazing how a load of adrenaline can utterly kill pain & how in its absence the nausea & agony kicks in.

The first thing the triage nurse in A&E said to me was "were you wearing a helmet????" When I replied in the negative, she launched into a full blown lecture.

Then I got sick on the floor. She got me some pain relief & shut up about helmets then....

Limestone1

billyhead wrote: »

Just curious what sort of accidents other posters had, what damage was done and how long were you recovering. I had my 3rd accident at the weekend gone. Came down as a result of black ice and suffered the usual skin burns, bruising, and a small cut but worst of all damaged some soft tissue according to the doctor in the area between the groin and the tailbone. Can hardly walk the last few days due to the pain from the tissue injury or lift my leg (No strength at all) and am on painkillers. The doc said to take it easy for the rest of the week. Cant see myself back on a bike for a while. Real pain in the arse and bored out of my tree lounging around at home:(

where was the ice last weekend ?

RidleyRider

Worst crash I had was this year, coming down off a hill that was just going back into the flat. The road was that stoney surface but for some reason there was a straight line cut into it just over the width of my front wheel. It was cut into a dip in the road also. Travelling at about 50km/hr I got stuck and flew straight over the handlebars. Landed straight on my head and flipped over onto my wrist. Broke my wrist, bruised pretty much my hole rib cage. I was lucky for my helmet, it cracked from the outside shell inwards. The helmet was a good inch and 3 quarters thick.

The usual as well- bruises, road rash, cuts and all that too.

Tonyandthewhale

Someone stopped suddenly in front of me in a group ride in the slieve aughteys. I swerved hard to the left to avoid him, lost grip in a patch of gravel and came down. Skidded along the ground for about 5 or 10m, bit of road rash on my hip and leg and a big chunk out of my elbow. No stiches needed or anything like that though, just put a plaster on it when I got home and it was grand.

Not a very exciting story but that's (luckily) the most damage I've had tp endure due to a bicycle crash.

Morrisseeee

"tis but a scratch"

:pac:



My own experience (which isn't too bad) was after a long spin I came home and proceeded up the driveway, ie. a 10% incline, and because there were 3 cars in the driveway (visitors) I decided to (try to) mount the footpath, alas I misjudged it, and before I knew it I had faceplanted the cement !
After a few seconds I regained my senses and knew at once that "yikes this isn't too good". My right hand felt funny, I glanced over and saw that my right forefinger was bent at a 45 degree angle, so I went about putting it back, I think if I hadn't of set it back straight away, I definitely wouldn't have done it at a later stage :eek:

MB Lacey

droidus wrote: »

I hate these threads.

They're kinda good though as a reminder to me to slow tf down, 'kill your speed, not yourself' n'all that.
My only accident was a combo of me going too fast, and a dumbass driver who turned right in front of me, I slammed on breaks, me and my bike skidded right along ranelagh road, with my head ending up on the floor, surrounded by car tyres.
Torn jacket, trousers and scratched bike, but luckily I was alright, was wearing a helmet.

Sorry to all those who have been hurt, I've been out sick for other reasons and it's never good for the soul when it's long term.
Op - get better soon.

billyhead

Wishbone Ash wrote: »

Sorry to hear that billyhead. Get well soon. Was it in the Rush area?

As you know, I'm out at the moment with a broken collar bone and 2 broken ribs and torn muscles/ligaments. It's the worst I've had.

Hi Wishbone,

Happened on the turn off for Loughshinny from the Skerries road. Didn't see the ice at all until after I landed in a heap. Decided to continue on my spin but after about 40km (accident happened about 8-9km into cycle) turned for home as the pain started to kick up. Disaster really as I was staring to put in some big mileage on the bike. Will have to get use to public transport for the foreseeable future. I hope your injury is healing well

souter

http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?p=73507198

Fine now, but lost what little nerve I ever had for descending


(this is getting a bit Quint/Hooper)

Lawrence1895

Three broken ribs in 2007. Was cycling home from work, some drunken (or maybe he was on drugs) teenager (between 15 and 18 approx) trying to kick me off the bike. Was flying over the handle bar and hit the road, landing on my side.
By the time, I got up and realized what happened, him and his mates legged it into a housing estate.
7 weeks out of work I was.

furiousox

About 4 years ago I moved in to let a car pass and clipped the footpath with my pedal which flipped me down with all my weight on my left shoulder, broke the arm at the very top where it meets the shoulder blade.
Car drove out in front of me about a year ago as I was descending a hill near the Naul, went over the bars and broke the left wrist.
Looking forward to breaking the collarbone any day now.

check_six

Nothing too gruesome for me (touch wood!) just standard road rash a few times producing some mediocre scarring that reminds me of the various misadventures.

One spill that really hurt involved landing on my hands at speed. One summer a few years back there had been uninterrupted sunshine for a number of days (anyone remember those summers?) and there was a good layer of dust on the roads. A sudden shower turned the roads really greasy, and I came off when my front wheel decided to slip out from under me as I was changing lanes around Stephen's Green in a fast spot where I'd regularly be able to hit 40-50kph. I landed on my hands and then flipped onto my back. I slid a good way down the road on the greasy surface, my bike sliding along with me. I could see the car following me, just beyond the end of my feet, and I was trying to do the calculation to see if they'd be able to stop any sooner than me on the slidey road. Luckily, 'Action Movie Reality' took over and the car stopped inches from me (and more importantly, the bike!).

The outcome was zero road rash, due to the slideyness (yay!), and two incredibly sore wrists which took months to come right again (boo!). The bike was grand.

Now for the obligatory "I dread to think..." bit:

I dread to think what would have happened if I hadn't been wearing my... bag on my back which sort of helped the slide down the road, I think.

Andy-Pandy

I've had two really close calls. One involved getting wedged between two buses on the quays. The bike went under the wheel but miraculously I jumped off the bike and landed on my feet. I very nearly got very hurt.

The second happened years ago as a kid. I was on a cycle tour with my scout troop in Wicklow. Was going fast down a very steep hill when both my bake cables snapped. At the end of the hill was a very sharp turn, bordered by a stone wall, which I had no chance of clearing. There was a small gap in the wall through which I could only see the top's of trees. I aimed for the gap, made it and then flew through the air. I fell about 30ft onto the soft pine needle covered floor of the forest, only to find I'd missed landing on boulders that where strewn all around me. I didnt have a scratch on me though my bike was totalled.

I've had lots of other fall's and been hit by a number of cars over the years, but nothing anywhere as bad as those two.
O
The most painfull thing that has happened to me was my chain snapping while giving it socks up a steep hill.

I nearly forgot my broken collarbone. Not as bad as i thought it would be.

monkeyslayer

In one crash when i was 17 I broke my two hands, my wrist, elbow and knee whilst mountain biking... My helmet was smashed to several pieces... I had huge hole in my right hand from where a rock implanted itself and went right up through my wrist bone like a wedge.... even to this day it still hurts. Used to do some really stupid **** on bikes and otherwise up until that day... bit more sensible now thankfully

trad

When I was about 15 out for a training spin. Coming down into Chapelizod heard something brake but saw nothing obvious. swinging out of the bars going up to the 15 acres out pops the front wheel. Lost most of the shin in the area of my left knee cap. Still interesting scar to this day.

Early 20's going home for lunch car pull in on it's correct side, passenger doors open to herb, no problem there, little sh1te runs around the front of the car and into my path. Slid up the road on my right hand side, could feel the flesh coming off my face, flipped over and broke my left wrist. 10 weeks holiday from work.

funkyjebus

Still recovering from mine. Came off the road bike 9 weeks ago due to bad road works and broke my wrist in 12 places, I now have a good bit of metal (titanium!) in my wrist. Its gonna be a long hard road to get back riding as I cant yet move my fingers fully. It think mtb is over for me now but cant wait to get back on the road.

NeedMoreGears

Flying down a hill on raleigh sportsman (5 yes 5 gears!) carrying a fishing rod in one hand - you can guess the rest. Nothing broken but loads of gravel embedded itself in various parts of my anatomy. Thankfully I had upgraded to long trousers a few weeks before.

Other than that just the usual cuts and bruises - nothing broken on me or the bike

davidsatelle100

coming down the N4 years ago hit a wheel rim (yes i could see it from miles away) hit the ground and the side barrier finished about 50 yards from the rim with a lot of gravel where my skin had been

few slower ones since but thankfully nothing broken

check_six

Just remembered a real nasty one that happened to a one time work colleague of mine. They came off their bike when they were just learning to cycle as a kid and nearly completely severed their tongue on the brake lever. They said it took months to be able to speak again. :eek:

For balance, another work colleague from the same place badly dislocated their elbow trying to take a pee. No bike involved.

These misfortunes can strike any time people! Wear a crash helmet and goggles while eating your rice krispies!

Indricotherium

Came off the mountain bike in the snow last year, in the bus lane of the N4, wasn't hurt, but every light I had was on the bike, and not on me, the bike slid into the road but I was left in an invisible heap ........ a lesson learned.

feck sake lads

Wishbone Ash wrote: »

Sorry to hear that billyhead. Get well soon. Was it in the Rush area?

As you know, I'm out at the moment with a broken collar bone and 2 broken ribs and torn muscles/ligaments. It's the worst I've had.

Man sounds bad speedy recovery been there my self.:(

feck sake lads

Broken collorbone
busted ribs
concusion
usual cuts collorbone was the worst though my own fault never seen the black ice :eek:

Canis Lupus

Cycling extremely hungover, approached a kerb, my brain forgot to hop up my front wheel and I went over the handlebars but awesomely landed mostly on my feet/bum.. Injury free :P I feel sorry for the less fortunate in this thread

shed head

me never crashed, one of my best friends died, fell in under the wheels of a truck

boiledsweets

Nearly getting caught under a car,drunk on a bike when i was 15,worst mistake ever,and never ever ever going to repeat such a mistake ever again,no way!Even when i was drunk i got such a scare,it scared me sober,i took to the rest of the journey walking with the bike..Never again

WakeyTyke

Shattered my wrist after clipping a back wheel - came down so quick I was still holding on to the drops and the wrist took the full impact. Permanently plated and pinned but has given me no problems over the years.

Also broke my left hip after taking a sharp left turn on a descent too sharply and the bike slid from under me. After crashing I found I couldn't weight bear on the leg so I managed to climb back on the bike and then cycled home! Rang my GP who advised that I go for an X-ray, luckily my next door neighbour had a pair of crutches after a hip replacement which I borrowed and then drove 50km to Ennis Hospital. Amazingly after all that I hadn't displaced the fracture so I didn't require surgery, just 2 weeks immobilised in traction. After 6 months I was as good as new, though it took a long time to get my confidence back on the descents.

chester3455

my worst accident was in a race in donegal.i was sprinting out of a corner a next thing i saw was two bodys on the ground infront of me i had no time to react and next thing i no i wake up to a commisaire asking me my name and do i no where i am.an amublance came and rushed me to hospital with a suspected concussion.
luckly i only had road rash on knee hip shoulder and elbow.i also got a nasty scar under my nose since.it could have been alot worse.i was back up on the bike after 2-3 weeks.

Beasty

Waiting for Brad to post now ...

doozerie

Beasty wrote: »

Waiting for Brad to post now ...

There may not be enough asterisks stockpiled on the Internet that would allow his probably sweary post to be suitably sanitised for public consumption. The Internet itself might blush.

Hope he makes a full and speedy recovery though. Even The Sun (don't click on it, I feel dirty for just posting the link) is reporting it, complete with quotes from a truck driver who didn't see it happen, quotes from an anonymous source, and a poor quality photo with a bicycle circled on it. Insightful.

Darkglasses

Cycled directly into a parked car, total brain-fart. Caught most of it with my left knee, badly bruised and lost a bar-end. Nothing lasting though thankfully, and the guy's car was ok

sherlok

My front wheel parted company with my mountain bike on a fast gravel road downhill. I hit the ground so quickly that my hands were still on the bars. I landed on the top of my head which destroyed my helmet, cut up my face and broke one of my hands. My neck was sore for about a year after that, but I count myself very lucky to get off so lightly.

dited

I am convinced my reading this thread yesterday is responsible for my crashing this morning. It's the only rational explanation

A_Sober_Paddy

Taking a couple of falls nothing major...

But I was once on the dual carriageway going downhill and hit a cats eye(on the yellow line) nearly threw me off the bike, I somehow manged managed to maintain control of the bike, I was going over 60kmph at the time so got off very lucky

seamus

Darkglasses wrote: »

Cycled directly into a parked car, total brain-fart. Caught most of it with my left knee, badly bruised and lost a bar-end. Nothing lasting though thankfully, and the guy's car was ok

Hah, just reminded me that I did the same thing about 15 years ago. Cycling home, heavy headwind and it started hailstoning, so I'm cycling along about 15km/h, head down and next thing I'm lying on a car bonnet. No injury, just embarrassment.
I actually felt bad that I may have damaged the car, but it's literally only occured to me now that the guy was parked on an off-road cycle track, facing the wrong way. So fnck him, I hope his bonnet was covered in scratches and dents.

slavedave

Tuesday night- making haste in the commute home. Took a roundabout at about 20-22 mph, next thing I'm hitting the deck hard. Head and shoulder took the main impact - very thankful I had a helmet on since it is cracked all the way through. Thought I had hit a wet manhole cover on it that I am well aware of normally. Then a driver started picking me up off the road repeatedly saying, "sorry mate". He helped me to the verge and left. Walked home but the shoulder was aching a fair bit.
Upshot is a broken Collar Bone and a bruised ego. Guess I may have been taken out by his car.