Jens Voigt – what legends are made of

Jens Voigt descends the Peyresourde Pass on a loaner bike after a crash shattered his own (Robin Wilmott)

On stage 16 of this year’s Tour de France, Jens Voigt showed us what legends are made of. About 2km’s into the descent of Peyresourde Pass, he blew his front tyre and he went down.  This crashed almost forced him out of the Tour for a second year in a row.

To make matters worse, the first team car was behind Andy Schleck, and the second had decided to go up ahead to hand out water bottles at the foot of the next climb. As a result Jens had no bike as his was shattered from the front wheel blow out.

According to Jens:

So then the broom wagon pulled up and was like, “Do you want to just get in?” And I said, “Oh no, I don’t need YOU!” But there I am with blood spurting out my left elbow and no bike. Finally, the race organizers got me a bike, but it was this little yellow junior bike. It was way too small for me and even had old-fashioned toe-clip pedals. But that is the only way I could get down the mountain, so I had to ride it for like 15-20 kilometers until I finally got to a team car with my bike.

Then, I still had to get up to the grupetto. All I can say is that that desperate times need desperate measures, but I got up there. And once I did it was grupetto all day long.

Needless to say, I had plenty of time to come up with a fitting book of the day. It’s from the Disk World series by Terry Pratchett. In it, the protagonist is Conan the Barbarian, who is a 70-year-old who has just survived everything. At one point he, and his other old warrior friends capture this village, but then they find that they are surrounded by an army of tens of thousands, and his only reaction is, “Oh man, it’s going to take days to kill all these people!” And that’s the way I was today when I was lying on the ground. I just thought, “Oh no, I’m going to Paris this year, I’m going to Paris. There’s just no way you are going to get me out of this race for the second year in a row!”

This just goes to show what a legend the man is becoming! No matter what bike he was riding, no matter what his circumstances were, he decided not to give up. You have to admire that?!

Wear a helmet or be guilty of negligence!

A recent high court case in the UK where a cyclist and motorcyclist collided (Smith v Finch 2009), the judge ruled that the cyclist could have been found partly liable if wearing a helmet would have prevented or reduced his or her injuries. What this means is that cyclists who don’t wear helmets can be found guilty of contributory negligence if they are injured in a road accident in the UK. Ouch!

In an interview with BikeRadar, Richard Brooks from a UK law firm explained the ruling in that if you are injured and a cycle helmet could have reduced your injuries, you may not be able to recover full compensation.

He also added, “Cyclists who “expose themselves to a greater degree of injury” by not wearing a helmet can now be found to be negligent, even though it is not a legal requirement in the UK to wear head protection when cycling. However, for this to happen it would have to be proved – using medical and other evidence – that a helmet would have prevented all of their injuries or made them a good deal less severe.”

Interesting judgement this and one I’m sure will be opening up debates amongst cyclists. That said,I’ll be interested to hear your thoughts on this, so please leave a comment below.

Helmet that served its purpose

So, took a good look at my helmet to assess the damage done to it following my crash.  Quite amazed to find where the cracks have appeared. At the very least, I’m pleased that it has done exactly what it was meant to do – protect my noggin in a crash.

Here are some pics of my helmet with the crash impact points and cracks in the frame.

My Pneumo

Impact point

First crack

Second crack

Inner view of first crack at rear of helmet

Inner view of second crack at rear of helmet

Holding clip for roll cage ripped and unusable

Well, it’s served me well. Now to get it all packaged up and ready to send back to Giro. No need to throw it away. Am sure they can in some way benefit from receiving it.

Crash & Brake – part II

On the operating table just before the op

It’s been 17 days since I crashed while out on a training ride on sunny Wednesday afternoon and eleven days since I had the operation to put a plate into my collarbone that resulted from the crash. See my first post on this here.

Now it’s been a strange time for me since the crash. For one, a lot of pain to endure, but also the want to get back on the bike.

Understandably getting back on the bike is not going to happen straight away. Firstly, my collarbone needs the time to sort itself out and heal properly. A minimum of four weeks according to the doctor before I can use my arm properly again. But at least three months before the bone will be properly healed (and about the same lenghth of time before I can get riding on the road again – according to the doc). That said, I can always hook the bike up to turbo trainer to get my legs turning again.

But, I just don’t feel like waiting that long. I have a serious urge to get back on the bike again, despite what has happened. As soon as I can get my arm to move in a circle without it causing too much pain, the bike will be on the turbo trainer. Just need to feel my legs moving round again. Hate sitting around not doing anything. I mean, reading cycling magazine and books does help to some extent, but it doesn’t make up for it.

At least this week to come has some objectives for me to complete. Need to get my claim form off to the private medical aid company, to get some money back for the time I spent in the hospital. Once that’s done, it’s off to shop for a new helmet. I already know what I am going to get. A Giro Ionos in red and black.  But before going helmet shopping, I am going to have to convince my wife that it’s time to get back on the bike. Understandably, as it is, she wants me to get rid of it. But that’s why I am need to work on that first. Am sure she’ll be ok with it – as it is, I’ve been riding for most of my life.

Anyway, time to get some pictures taken of the damage done to my Giro Pneumo. Will post them up on here a little later. Anyway, here’s an x-ray pic of the plate holding my collarbone together.

Plate on collarbone

Laters!

Crash & Break

So yesterday I went out training on my road bike. I had taken the week off from work so that 1) I could spend some time with my wife and kids, and 2) to get some good serious miles into the legs on the bicycle.

Now I’ve been training approximately three times a week for the past few weeks. Whether it be on the turbo trainer, my rollers or on the open road. Anything to help get my general fitness up.

The weather hasn’t been the greatest this week, so when the sun made an appearance yesterday, I thought I’d make the most of it and get onto the bike. So I got changed, made up my water bottles, pumped my tyres and off I went.

I made my way up the A4 towards Reading. I felt really good going out, keeping an average of 31/32 kms/h (about 18.5 miles/h). After 20 km’s (about 12.4 miles) I decided to turn around and make my way home.  With 10 km’s to go, I made my way onto one of the large two lane roundabouts with five exits on it. I had to take the fourth exit from where I was coming from.

The first exit I signalled right and made it across with no hassle. Approaching the second exit I signalled that I was going right and not turning off. The car behind me in my lane slowed down to let me cross, which I did. The car in the right hand lane didn’t seem to see me or my signalling and failed to slow down. With this, I had to pull back to the left to avoid going into the car’s path.

Unfortunately for me, I pulled too far to the left and now I was aiming directly for the curb in the road. I tried to correct myself but I had passed the point of return and I clipped it. Down I went. My shoulder and head took the brunt of the fall. My bike came over me and my feet then clipped out the pedals. The motion rolled me over onto my back.  It all happened so quickly! Then the pain hit me. My head was pounding and I couldn’t move my arm. I swear I could see stars at that point. (My helmet is a write-off, but at least it did what it was intended for.)

After that everything felt like a lifetime to happen. Luckily for me, about six or seven people stopped to help. One lady, Hazel, was a nurse so I was in good hands.  They called for an ambulance and for the police. The reason for the police was due to the fact that I wasn’t lying in the safest place on the side of a busy roundabout and they could help cone off the traffic.

The paramedic arrived and gave me loads of gas and air. It helped me to relax but didn’t do much for the pain. He called for an ambulance. When they arrived, the team loaded me up on some morphine (courtesy of the NHS) and helped get me into the back of their vehicle.

At this point my wife arrived, after the paramedic called her to let her know what had happened. She was very calm considering she didn’t know exactly how I had come down. The police helped load my bike in her car. Off we went to the hospital.

The paramedics were great and so were the hospital staff. I had some x-rays taken at the hospital (am waiting to get copies of these from the hospital), made an appointment to see the specialist and sent on my way.

So after a night of pain and very little sleep, I went back to the hospital this morning for my appointment with the specialist. Due to the severity of the break and the splintering of the bone, we decided to have a plate put in to help straighten the break. Am booked in for next Tuesday, 12 August. To be very honest, am not looking forward to it. But will do anything right now to get rid of or at least ease the pain. Plus, have been told I am not allowed to ride (or drive for that matter) for the next six weeks.

So, want to see how bad the break is, check out these two pics below. You will see how the bone pushes upwards on my left hand side. I’ll try and add the x-ray’s as soon as I get them.

Again, huge thanks to all those wonderful people that stopped to help me out, the NHS paramedics and the Thames Valley police. Most importantly, a massive massive thank you to my wife, for being an absolute saint for taking care of my every need the past two days.

Kudos to Giro for making great helmets!

Augustyn survives crash down mountain side

Barloworld rider, John Lee Augustyn, today endured a spectacular crash during the 16th stage of the Tour de France which left him stranded halfway down a mountain side.

Augustyn crossed the summit of the day’s second unclassified climb on his own after attacking his leading group half a kilometre from the summit. But moments later, after being rejoined by his group, he misjudged a right hand bend and, despite braking, his momentum threw him over the edge to leave him 50 metres below on the gravelly mountain side.

After dusting himself off and waiting for a new bike he eventually finished in 35th place at just over five minutes behind stage winner Cyril Dessel of the AG2R team.

Let’s hope Augustyn’s legs are feeling good for tomorrow’s stage up Alp d’Huez.