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My trip to the ER yesterday

H

hews500d

Charter Member 2011
Reading Willy's account of his trip to the ER yesterday prompted me to post about my experience.

I've been a mountain bike rider for many years now and earlier this summer got bitten by the bug to start riding road bikes more. Purchased my pride and joy in mid-July, a Trek 2.1 Alpha.

Yesterday, went on my 3rd major road ride and first organized ride, a benefit for the community hospital foundation in my town. It was to be a 100K ride and included one 5 mile climb over "The Snake" as the motorcycle guys call it. I was well on the way to finishing without stopping anywhere along the whole route to rest (a first for me), when 7 miles from the finish two dogs come out of nowhere, almost bite my buddy that is riding in front of me, then one of the stupid idiot mutts STOPS right in front of me. Front tire makes contact with the mutt's ribs and down I go, hard, on my right shoulder. Wasn't going over 12 to 15 mph, but holy crap that road is hard when you hit it . First instinct was to get the heck out of the road, fast, luckily the car coming up behind us stopped and didn't run over my bike. In my panic to get out of the road, I thought nothing about dragging the bike with me.

Trip to th ER, nothing broken, just a lot of road rash on my right knee and shoulder is sore as hell today, sitting here typing this with heat on it. Popping a Lortab for pain control and sleep at night. Sheriff deputy says more than likely the owner will be charged with letting animals "run at large." Owner showed no concern towards how I was at all, whatsoever, other than offering me a seat on her porch while waiting on the sheriff's department to arrive. Oh, she WAS nice enough to let me know they were "training" the dogs to not run in the road. I think they have an epic fail so far... Now the task begins on getting my ER bill paid for..

I think this experience has pretty much ruined road cycling for me, I've came to the realization it's no fun riding if you're constantly worried about the flea-ridden mutt that's going to come out and try to bite me, cause me to wreck, or the drunken-meth-head coming around a curve, or up behind me, and taking me out with his/her vehicle.

If anyone in the East TN area is interested in a road bike let me know, surprisingly the only damage is a slightly scuffed area on the handlebar tape and the tops of the gear shifter on the right side. I'm going back to trail and mountain riding where it's safer!

Darrell
 
That totally sucks! I've been lucky on my bike so far. I love road riding. So much faster, smoother, and generally more consistent than riding on trails- at least until dogs start popping out.

On my first benefit ride a large deer ran out in front of me no more than 30 feet away. It scared the sh*t out of me! That could have been a lot worse than a trip to the ER. Thankfully it didn't stop...


Good to hear you're mostly OK! :engel016:
 
The dogs' owner (or her homeowners insurance) should cover your ER costs. If she was cited by the police, you definitely have a case should you choose to pursue it.
 
Hit a dog with a Honda 650 years ago on a gravel road. Luckily I saw the mutt and was able to get slowed down to about 10-15mph when I hit him.

A lot of folks here in Tennessee apparently unaware of how much you're legally responsible for anything that happens when your animals are running out. Because they sure let them loose to cause mayhem on the roads and with their neighbors.
 
Willy said:
A lot of folks here in Tennessee apparently unaware of how much you're legally responsible for anything that happens when your animals are running out. Because they sure let them loose to cause mayhem on the roads and with their neighbors.
Click to expand...

Yes Willy, they most certainly are unaware, judging from the amount of mutts around here. Some of them are bordering on psychotic, pepper spray won't even turn them around.
 
My uncle had a sort of similar experience with a dog running into the road...but he was on a full dress Harley. He had talked to the owners of the dog many times before, telling them that they needed to keep their dog chained, in the house, or put up a fence...but being of the inbred type, they said that they were going to train their dog to stay out of the road and to stop chasing cars, motorcycles and bikes.

Well...one day my uncle was cruising down the road, here comes the dog, my uncle knew that there was no way he could avoid the dog this time...so he prepped himself for a crash. But things didn't work as he thought they were going to. Instead of simply trying to run backward in front of his Harley, the dog decided it was going to bite his front tire. The dog's snout went into the spokes, got spun around into the back of the fork tubes, and the dog....sans muzzle....was tossed up into my uncle's lap.

Uncle Orland brought the bike to a stop, carried the muzzleless, yelping dog to the owners' door, knocked..and when they opened it, he dropped the massively bleeding dog onto their livingroom carpet and said "You better do some more work on training this mutt to stay out of the road."

And with that, he walked back to his Harley, fired it back up, and continued on his ride.

OBIO

PS: The dog never ran into the road again.
 
Around here one can run into moose and bear while riding your bike, but I still am more concerned when I see a dog. Dogs are much less predictable (especially the ones out loose). I have volunteered for about four years to do trail work in town. We keep trees limbed up and brush cleared out so visibility is good. It also reduces fire danger.
 
My favourite bike ride is on a path along our seafront with a dedicated cycle lane.
You get a lot of dog walkers on this stretch, and the worse one are the dogs on these extendible leads.
First you think your safe to overtake, and then they shoot over the cycle path spanning a rope in front of your bike...!
I've had many such incidents.

Stuart
 
Happy to hear you are relatively unscathed Darrell.

Glad I'm a cat person, they are bright enough not to go chasing wheels in the first place; and also glad I am in the UK - at least with the NHS, whatever it's faults, means we don't have to worry about costs as well (at the moment at least).
 
Thanks all for the well wishes. I think I may have dislocated my collarbone and why the ER doc didn't catch it is beyond me, so I'm off to try to get in with my primary care doctor today to see what the next steps are. Good news is the sorness is going away and I've got more range of motion in my right shoulder today so hopefully it's nothing serious or that will have long term complications.

Paiken mentioned homeowners insurance. She's renting the house from someone that lives in Virginia, sooooooo... no homeowners insurance on HER part. I'm waiting on the police report so I can contact the property owner. If not, I guess she and I have a court date. I'm not the "sue happy" type, but just so happens one of the attorneys here in town is an avid cyclist and was involved in the same type accident a couple years ago himself. He may be a good one to have a consultation with. I also have the right to pursue charges myself according to the investigating officer, but if the judge won't sign off on their evidence, he said it would be unlikely that I could file them myself.

Don't get me wrong, I'm an animal person myself, we have 4 cats, used to have a Doberman several years ago, but I'm really to the point that IRRESPONSIBLE dog owners are not high on my list of favorite people right now. It's one thing for an animal to accidently break loose, but to be riding down the road having a dog come growling and barking at you, and to have the owner standing there shouting "come back here fluffy" or whatever, yeah like THAT's going to work. Or usually, as in Saturday's case, the owner is no where to be seen. It's amazing the number of "inbreds" around here that just HAS to have a dog or multiple dogs, brings them home, turns them loose and never sees them again, so fluffy decides to start seeking it's own entertainment.

Just frickin amazing...:sniper:

Darrell
 
OBIO said:
My uncle had a sort of similar experience with a dog running into the road...but he was on a full dress Harley. He had talked to the owners of the dog many times before, telling them that they needed to keep their dog chained, in the house, or put up a fence...but being of the inbred type, they said that they were going to train their dog to stay out of the road and to stop chasing cars, motorcycles and bikes.

Well...one day my uncle was cruising down the road, here comes the dog, my uncle knew that there was no way he could avoid the dog this time...so he prepped himself for a crash. But things didn't work as he thought they were going to. Instead of simply trying to run backward in front of his Harley, the dog decided it was going to bite his front tire. The dog's snout went into the spokes, got spun around into the back of the fork tubes, and the dog....sans muzzle....was tossed up into my uncle's lap.

Uncle Orland brought the bike to a stop, carried the muzzleless, yelping dog to the owners' door, knocked..and when they opened it, he dropped the massively bleeding dog onto their livingroom carpet and said "You better do some more work on training this mutt to stay out of the road."

And with that, he walked back to his Harley, fired it back up, and continued on his ride.

OBIO

PS: The dog never ran into the road again.
Click to expand...

.. and sadly enough, that owner probably STILL didn't learn their lesson if they're anything like the local population around here.

Darrell
 
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