horns of wilmington's cow

By anth

So today I got run over...

Video Here

First time I've been hit by a car. It's somewhat disconcerting.

Doesn't look as dramatic as it felt, and annoyingly the camera seems to have taken a while to fire up as I joined the road so only captures the few seconds before impact. I'd been waiting for a stream of traffic coming down the hill to clear in order to turn right. I would have been in front of the Yaris for a good ten seconds, in clear view. The van coming down and turning was in the last of the stream of traffic, so I set off to make the turn behind.

Yaris man sees the opportunity to pull out... Straight through me. Often here people will nudge out, but it's always clear they are making sure they can get out after you've passed. Something felt different about this and I managed to haul on the brakes, and at the same time jump backwards off the bike (with a lovely pirouette as you'll see). The car basically slammed into the front of the bike (and it felt really really hard, that surprised me a bit) just as I managed to get off. Without slowing down I'd have been sprawled on the bonnet.

Remarkable I was untouched, and the bike 'seems' fine (I've not had a proper check, I can see a scrap of red paint on one of the forks, so need to make sure it hasn't bent).

And the classic excuse. Perfect light, a 6'3" cyclist dressed in a bright grey top and orange, white and black helmet 3 yards in front of you for ten seconds.... Sorry, I really didn't see you.

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