Down on February 8, 2000

Well, sports fans, I had my sixth accident in 29 years on Tuesday.  I was riding home from work at about 1615 hours.  I was on Colfax heading West and a panel-van was heading East.  The van made an illegal left turn and I had about 3 seconds to respond before impact.  Under normal circumstances, at 20-35 MPH, I should have been able to stop.  Unfortunately, I was distracted by an automobile changing lanes next to me and the van appeared to be continuing which would have cleared my lane (inside lane).  Because the van appeared to be moving forward, the little alarms that generally go off were delayed.  As I approached the van, it suddenly stopped and I had only a second or two to take evasive/emergency actions.  Since it was rush hour in Denver, there was no where to go so I slammed on the brakes.  There wasn't enough room to stop the bike so I knew I was going to impact the right side of the van just behind the front door.  Just before impact, I turned the handlebars hard to the left forcing the bike to begin a laydown.  I knew there wasn't sufficient room for this maneuver but it sent me to the left upon impact instead of over or through the windshield.  Instead, I was thrown clear of the bike onto the pavement.

Here's what I was wearing:  full-face Shoei RF-800 helmet, leather chaps, motorcycle boots, full-padded gloves, down liner and full leather jacket.  Here are the damages to me:  bruised ribs, left side where I appear to have impacted with the left handlebar.  According to the police and hospital staff who attended me, a direct frontal impact with a vehicle at 20-25 MPH usually causes severe damage to the biker.   I was fortunate in large part because of the gear I wore.  I suffered no damage to my cloths (except for a t-shirt that the doctor cut off to examine my chest) and I was able to walk out of the hospital.

I will have to replace the helmet (good for only one impact) and electric gloves.  That's pretty much it except for the damages to the bike.

Bottom line is I'm writing this because I wore the right gear (I'm not looking to look cool but to ride until I'm 100!) and took the right actions to minimize damage to both myself and my bike.  Together, those two actions definitely saved me from more extensive injuries. 

Lesson:  Wear a helmet and wear the right gear.  It was a warm day (63 degrees) and there were other bikes on the road but the riders were wearing shirts and/or no helmets (not all but a fair percentage).  Had this happened to them they would have likely suffered head injuries and would have certainly suffered road rash to some degree.  Either way, they would have been in a lot worse shape than I'm in now; I'm taking ibuprofen before bed for pain and that will probably go away by tomorrow.

Live to Ride
Ride to Live

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