Crash!

 

I was in San Antonio many years ago but only had a couple of hours to explore the riverwalk. My wife had never been there, so we decided to spend a few days there to explore the riverwalk and other nearby sights. We walked around the riverwalk loop, ate along the river and generally explored the riverwalk. Texas was a state I had never ridden in so I planned to ride along the riverwalk while we were there.

The next full day was planned for riding. My wife doesn’t ride much so she explored the Alamo while I rented a bike a rode the southern part of the riverwalk where bikes are allowed. I found a bike rental along the riverwalk that was less than a mile from our hotel. I walked there, rented a hybrid bike and was off.

I was wearing my helmet mount video camera to record my ride for my YouTube channel. One drawback of my GoPro camera is poor battery life. As a result, I generally only record highlights along the way. At about 3 or 4 miles into my ride I encountered an interesting bridge for the trail to cross a small stream. I decided that I would back up the trail to record the approach in addition to the bridge itself.

When I made my second U turn, I reached up to start my camera. Coming out of the u turn with only my left hand on the handlebars I wanted to go slow. It was a downhill, so I applied the brakes-with my left hand. The combination of using the front brake, a less intuitive sense of the rental bike, the distraction of turning on the camera and the turn resulted in me going over the handlebars.

I rolled when I hit the ground and did not hit my head-I was wearing a helmet, always do. I was a bit sore but not overly so. The bike was undamaged, so I continued riding for another couple of hours. Near the end of the ride, I was starting to feel it. Once I returned my rental bike I elected for an Uber instead of walking back to the hotel.

Once back at the hotel I showered and went for a slow walk to a nearby restaurant for dinner. From the pain I figured I had bruised or broken a rib. I knew from experience that doctors don’t do much for this injury except for some pain meds.

The next morning I was intermittently getting excruciating pain. It was time for some medical care. My wife asked the front desk at the hotel about the nearest emergency room. The clerk directed her to a particular hospital. We put the hospital into Uber app and it came up as a children’s hospital. Went back to the clerk who assured us that they had an adult wing.

When we arrived at the hospital, we found out that they didn’t have that adult wing as of 10 years ago. Nevertheless, they did an initial evaluation, gave me some morphine and arranged transport to another hospital. I found out the other hospital was not the nearest hospital, rather the nearest trauma center. The transportation was an ambulance.

Upon arrival a team of medical people descended upon me. One person was asking how the accident happened. While the answer was being recorded another person was asking about my medical history. At the same time someone was checking my spine, someone else was starting an IV and another was taking an EKG. I am not even sure what others were doing but there were about ten people working on me simultaneously. After several exams, CAT scans, blood tests and other stuff it was concluded I had two mildly displaced rib fractures with muscle spasms around the break. After muscle relaxers, pain meds, an overnight in the hospital and much pleading they allowed me to leave to catch my flight home.

I crashed before getting the camera turned on, so I don’t have video from the crash. In retrospect I think my broken ribs were from the end of the handlebars hitting me after the fall. After years of riding this was the first fall that required medical attention. Hopefully it will be the last.

Here is a video of my ride minus the crash: