Our very own Gabrielle Suver got hit by a car while on a training ride yesterday. The driver fled the scene, and left her badly injured on the side of the road without any care in the world.
I’m so furious. Riding outside, especially down here in Florida is always a gamble with your life. So shocking to have that hit so close to home this time. Just last week I joined a small group ride for 38 Miles out in the open, and what I experienced in these two hours left me all stressed out to the core. It’s mind boggling how careless most of these motorists behave around us cyclists.
Gabbi sustained serious, but luckily not life threatening injuries, is facing a spinal surgery, and has a long road to recover in front of her. Our thoughts go out to her, and the local community is ready to help where we can, and stand by her side on the long journey of getting her back.
If you can, please consider pitching in a small amount to help her face the financial challenges of her medical recovery process.
Such a nice person. She was on the Cozumel race list for next weekend. I really hope somebody saw the vehicle and is working with the police. Any time there’s a post about bicyclist the comments are pretty much, “I’ll hit them”. I need to work on my indoor setup because Florida loves tourist but hate cyclist.
Done. Wish her all the best on her recovery. Its really a shame and infuriating how psycho many car drivers are towards cyclists but also really anybody not them in traffic. Very glad that these assaults happen less in Western Europe.
So sorry to hear and wishing her the speediest recovery possible.
I have family in Florida and visit a couple times a year. I leave a bike out there to train whenever I visit. I am always nervous any time I have to share a roadway with vehicles. Particularly in Florida, it seems like many motorists feel we owe them a debt of gratitude for not indiscriminately killing us.
Oh my gosh, I’m so sorry for Gabbi! That is awful. I follow her on Instagram and she is a lovely person and amazing athlete.
And sad to see this is around Clermont. I used to like to do training camps down there with my coach. I always found most the drivers pretty OK and even better than Vermont. But I guess it’s really a crap shoot out there. You never know who’s behind the wheel. We put a lot of faith in complete strangers and our life is in their hands.
Yes, Gabbi is one of the sweetest Athletes I know, it’s so unspeakable sad!
If we can only learn one lesson from this - Never, ever go on a ride solo. If she hadn’t been found by someone who cared, stopped, and called the authorities, the outcome could have been way worse.
It’s not about visibility (Gabbi is always dressed in the most colorful way you can imagine), or how we behave (she’s an experienced rider who always follows the road laws, keeps to the right, and does everything in her power to be safe out there and respect traffic), or what time of the day we go for a ride (in this instance it was bright daylight already), or how many safety features we are carrying and wearing (like radar, tail lights, MIPS helmet), we are always at the mercy of the people in cars (or more often down here trucks). It’s just a shame.
I really hope that whoever hit her and left her bleeding, and badly injured at the side of the road, and decided to just drive on will be found, and held accountable!