I am amazed at the number of people I see on training rides taking those kind of risks.

Some simple facts and rules:

Don't pass on the right. Yes, if you are on the shoulder or bike lane, you are on the right. That means you don't go faster than vehicles in the lane next to you. Motorists are not expecting to get passed on that side, and may suddenly turn into a parking lot or "use" that extra space. Of course you can pass if traffic is stopped... slowly... with hands on the brakes and very alert.

Intersections. Hands on the brakes, not the aero bars. Slow down and look for vehicles that are in a position to be a danger to you.

Wear bright clothing.

Use bright flashing lights. These are very important if you ever ride when the sun is low on the horizon. Or if it is a sunny day and you are in shadow. The motorist can see it if they can't see you. You can get them for ~$30 each.

Your *front* brake is the one that can stop you quickly. Not the rear.

I suppose I should be happy of my minor injuries, but my worst crash(on the road, Not counting MTB) is from a rabbit jumping into my spokes.

I got thrown into grass&cramp earth though, thankfully. Impressive slide distance, too!

I believe that most of the time the motorist does in fact not see the cyclist.

In part this is true.

How else to explain, me, while cycling blatantly and obviously, signaling a move to the left, to an approaching vehicle from the rear, and starting to drift over in that direction, and the motorist staring direct ahead and NOT seeing me! It's happened numerous times to me. What are they looking at?


It does happen, and as I've said just now, it's happened, numerous times to me, it does not really excuse the driver - I was RIGHT IN THEIR LINE OF SITE! Had they hit me or run over me, the story would again be the tiresome, "I did not see them" excuse.

Seeing as much of what is going on, on the road is part of driving. I took a top quality drivers ed course. A HUGE amount of time was spent on observation skills. It's clear to me that, many drivers really don't take the observation skiils part of driving that seriously.

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Steve Fleck @stevefleck | Blog

Observation Skills -- Any research comparing Cyclist vs Pedestrian (as observed from motor vehicle)? Is the excuse, "I didn't see him", as excepted when the victim is a pedestrian?

biking on public roads is ALWAYS dangerous. you have to bike defensively brake sooner wear a good helmet and always expect the cars to do what you hope they dont

The really scary thing is that 90% of the time, a car driver only needs a very low level of situational awareness to not get in an accident. Basically, stay in your lane and pay just enough attention not to rear end the car in front of you and you'll almost always get to where you are going without crashing. Most drivers put a little more into it than that but many don't, at least from time to time. Its not like any average driver you come across is guaranteed, or even likely, to be hyper aware and we are just one more thing to look for. A bike requires an inattentive driver to dig out of a pretty deep stupor.

Unfortunately, I'm in a somewhat congested areas so I'm balancing convenience on how far away from home to drive to to start my ride vs. scenery and traffic. I drove a few miles from my house to avoid the most heavy traffic area, which I have ridden on my road bike at times. The extra wide shoulder on this road is a designated bike lane as well with bike symbols painted on the shoulder every so often. While it is a faster 55mph road in places, its not always high traffic, at least not where I was on a Saturday afternoon. My other choices are more rural roads at lower speed limits (35-50), but often little or no shoulder, and a farther drive from home. I'm not sure how much safer they are with no shoulder.

As far as hammering it on a training ride, I'm not sure how you define that. I Don't consider myself a strong cyclist, so not really sure I was hammering it. My speed going down this hill topped at 32, which is not that fast going downhill in aero, I have been faster coasting on steeper hills. How do you get experience in aero if you don't train for it? I do plan to reconsider my routes for the future, add the front light, and maybe a camera of some kind, but not sure how much more to do.

Well, this is too general to be accurate, I think. I regularly ride a *very busy* road with two lanes in each direction and a moderate-to-zero shoulder. How can this work? I ride during rush hour. When the cars are mostly stopped or moving very slowly. I have folks say - 'you ride your bike on *that* road'? My response? It's pretty darn close to riding in a parking lot. So, lots of other factors are involved than just 'avoid busy roads'. I'm actually most cautious on that road - sometimes finding less convenient alternatives - during 'off times' when drivers routinely exceed the posted 40 mph speed limit by 10 mph and are texting/distracted. I'm not advocating for selecting busy roads to ride, mind you, but just pointing out that the occasional, distracted driver at 50 mph might be a bigger threat than the 5 mph traffic-congested route.

I too have found it very difficult to find safe places to train in aero. Regular road riding is much easier. There's just too much loss of control in aero. Maybe an extension mounted brake lever would oe good for training. That would lead to bad habits I imagine.

Agreed here. I got hit last summer and now am much more cautious about where I ride my tri bike vs roadie. I moved into Chicago from the burbs where I could ride right from my house. But now if I want to ride from my house I ride the roadie since I have a few miles of busier roads to get to the burbs where I can ride aero. Maybe I'd be more likely to ride tri bike but it's not comfy sitting up in. But super comfy in aero. Really annoying because driving to ride adds like an hour to an already long ride so unless it's over 2.5 hours I usually ride trainer.

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You got me thinking re: hammering downhills. One of my rides has a decent that I hit 70+ (kph). It's only 2k long but there are a few spots where a deer could cross. lucky for me I ride in the middle of the day when they are usually (key word) bedded. It would be a bad day to hit one of those at that speed.

I'm still going to let it rip, but, it does give me pause.

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I saw this on a white board in a window box at my daughters middle school...
List of what life owes you:
1. __________
2. __________
3. __________

My point was to ride aero on the flats and hills where your speeds are not so great. There isn't much time to react and brake in aero, so the higher the speed the greater the risk. Plus you don't get much training benefit from going fast downhill. Everyone can go fast down hill. So ride hard and fast on the flats and up the hills in aero but exercise caution at the higher down hill speeds. At least that is my theory. I crashed at approx. 25 mph, breaking my clavicle, road rash from ankle to shoulder and split my helmet. I have often thought what it would have been like if I had been going down hill at 35 or faster! Ouch.

I just bought a road bike, as despite adding bright flashing lights etc. I was just about creamed by a truck 3 separate times last season. Two of those were folks who passed me on a 2-lane rural road just as someone was coming the other way (so they didn't/couldn't move over to give me more than an inch of room between me and their side mirror). The other time, someone actually took an angry run at me with his Yukon when the car in front of him slowed down and waited to pass me safely. There's just no safe time or place to be in the aerobars (from my local experience) unless you're on a closed course. Which completely sucks, but there it is.

Good news, the car driver's insurance company has agreed that they are responsible for damages and will pay bike repair costs. While I've had some bruising and soreness crop up, nothing serious so if I can get the bike looked at and back in order I'll move on, having learned some more about cycling risk and being even more careful about route selection and defensiveness in the future. Looking forward to another week or so of solid training before tapering for my first half in May.

As has been said, write down ANY and all medical issues you're having that you didn't have pre-accident. Get them checked out by a Dr.

I was hit by a car 8-9 months ago. Initial issues for the first two weeks that dissipated, but then came roaring back once I eased off the training and let my body recover.

I would strongly recommend documenting everything just in case, and chatting with an MD if necessary. Good luck getting it all sorted out!