I did get hit by the door, but it was still closed. Sunday afternoon, summertime on Ocean Avenue in Santa Monica can be pretty hectic. The park overlooking the bluffs is very attractive and probably the best place for a young family to go to get out of the heat.
Woe to the poor cyclist that gets in the way of a car diving for a parking space.
Ocean is a slight downhill grade and I was in excellent shape in 2002 so I was cruising along at 30 mph, just about the speed of traffic. Up ahead, I notice that a car pulled out of a parking space - just far enough ahead that it wasn't obnoxious. And it was such a beautiful day, why worry...Then the car next to me, who had recently pulled up along side of me, veers hard into my thigh. I am not a wall flower, so I start screaming and pounding on the window but the car just keeps coming. The woman in the passenger seat turns to look me in the eyes and I can see she is screaming behind the glass, but the car just keeps turning into the newly opened space. I had nowhere to go so I hit the curb without being able to slow and this turned out to be a good thing as the sidewalk is double wide.. I had enough momentum to fly over said side walk and land on the grass beyond, tumbling into a palm tree. The driver was nice enough, admitted to being a sometime cyclist. Everything seemed fine until I got on the bike to go home. The first left hand corner I took, the carbon front fork failed and down I went at 5 mph, separating my shoulder. Oh, well.
No comments:
Post a Comment