I took my first gnarly header over my handlebars the other day… I refuse to engage in finger-pointing (particularly since I have about a 50% blame-share) but I would like all pedestrians to please listen on multi-use paths for people like me who need to get by them. Had I been able to remain on the sidewalk, I wouldn’t have had to get off the sidewalk. This is important, because when I got back on said sidewalk, it decided to jam my wheels in a way that stopped bike momentum. This is a problem, because I kept going… and fell on the rough sidewalk… and skidded… for a few feet.

Ouch.

Contact point numbers 1-5 now all are pretty shredded up, but healing. The left knee never really wanted to close up until about 2 days in (hint: that’s when you’re supposed to get stitches I think?). The road rash on my left forearm is the worst… that’ll take a week or more to stop smarting (see above). The heel-of-hand scrapes are particularly fun when typing.

Like I said, I have to take some blame here… I was rushing, there was no need to take a risk and go off the sidewalk onto the grass. Still, I can’t help but feel like I need a little help from pedestrians who are unaware of requests to move to the right when a faster person (biker, runner, walker?) who is sharing the path with them needs to get by.

But now I have some solid biking scars to share. So there’s that.