Wednesday, September 29, 2010

Bike Falling Guinness Record?

I rode the 5 miles in to work with my new egg-beater pedals and bike cleats without incident. I was so excited to try them out and begin realizing the 10% boost in thrust I thought I heard about somewhere.

However, my fortunes shifted in the afternoon when after getting my hair trimmed and styled I began the return trip to the office by hopping on my egg-beater-equipped Rampar and heading out of the parking lot. Coming to a stop just behind an SUV that was leaving the parking lot, I realized that I had stopped without disengaging from the pedals. A second or two later I was writhing on the ground with a freshly scraped elbow.

One bright spot was that a concerned man behind me came and gave me a hand up. The kindness was really appreciated.

Thinking one good, painful spill was going to be enough to enact a Pavlovian caution response, you can imagine my surprise when not 30 minutes later I crashed again!

Perhaps I shouldn't blame Pavlov, since the basis of my second crash was arguably an excess of misplaced caution.

See, I decided for the short trip from building 1 to building 3, that I didn't even need to engage the pedals (elbow still throbbing a bit), which I didn't.
But my mind was a little distracted with smugness as I quickly caught and then passed others that were going to the same meeting I was heading for. And, as I shifted my weight to dismount, and my bike started tipping left, my cleat suddenly engaged in the pedal and Whomp! My second crash in about 30 minutes' time.

I was able to look up in time to see my coworker looking down on me looking smug that he wasn't foolhardy enough to ride a bike to meetings.

I got back on the horse, but not without wondering how many times I could get on that particular horse before I should begin questioning my sanity.

8 comments :

Anonymous said...

The bigger they are, the harder they fall, hee hee. Watch out!

Amboy Observer said...

So I've noticed. Luckily all the biking I've been doing has helped me drop a few pounds. Whew!

Momsie said...

Your new coif was donned by a helmet, no?
Sorry to hear of the spills, I often wonder what non-intuitive thinker clips a person to anything, evidently it's all about commitment!

Amboy Observer said...

I plead the fifth.

Protection that would have been useful in these incidents includes elbow and knee-pads.

Momsie said...

I did everything in my power to get you here safely please do everything in your power to insure your continued safety.

Amboy Observer said...

But of course.

Anonymous said...

I took one full on spill and one half spill (kind of caught myself in a really awkward slow motion, half-crouched way) when I first started using my eggbeaters. It becomes second nature after a while - the pedals, not the crashing :-)

I also found a very noticeable improvement in efficiency with my eggbeaters. I particular notice it when climbing and descending hills for speed. On the flats I really don't notice it, but I also don't sprint on the flats which I think would change things.

Tom.

Bop-op said...

You've got three more crashes to go before you catch up to me.

I did my first three crashes in private, before going out into public. Maybe I needed the public embarassment to learn effectively.

Long, neoprene biking pants helped to cushion one fall. I didn't even scrape my knee that time.