Crashes

When I'm not racing or riding with Team WHAYNE, I often ride with the Bluegrass Cycling Club. It's a great club with a lot of benefits and cheap to join. They do a lot of good around here for the cycling community and we're lucky to have them in Fayette Co.

For the most part, riding with a group like this is safer - much safer than riding by yourself. There is the element of caution you have to take when riding closely with multiple people, but learning how to do this safely is a big part of cycling, and I think you're missing out if you never learn to ride in a group.

Unfortunately crashes will happen, which is what happened last Thursday, and there are several things to be aware of when they do happen. This particular ride was a perfect example of how to handle the situation, and also showed why riding in a club or group is important and safer.

So here's a few things I've been thinking about sharing since Thursday on crashes.

1. Resist the urge to stop and turn immediately to help. When you hear a crash behind you, avoid the temptation to look back, slow down suddenly, or veer off your line. Come to a stop slowly like you would at an intersection, use your hand signals and tell the people around you calmly that you are stopping (at the side of the road). It's really easy to create a chain reaction and cause another crash.

2. If it happens in front of you try and hold your line as much as possible and roll through the area to keep it clear. You don't want to block the road if there are multiple riders behind you who all need to slow down safely and stop in a safe distance.

3. Once everyone has pulled over safely, if the road can't be cleared immediately, then have two people go in either direction up the road to warn traffic about the rider on the road.

4. Find out who is trained in First Aid - sometimes the person with the biggest ego wants to take over, that's fine if they're trained, but if someone is trained in First Aid, that person should be deciding how best to care for the injured person. Sometimes letting one person take charge is better than arguing over it - put the injured person first.

5. If the person has a head, neck, or back injury, it may be necessary remove their helmet to help them breathe (or at least undo the chin strap). You must then stabilize their head by placing your hands on either side of their ears to act like a splint.

6. A severely injured person is likely to go into shock, you can help prevent this by continuously talking to them, reassuring them, and by keeping them warm - a space blanket is a great thing to pack for this reason. They fold up into a very small space and this is what they used at the club ride.

7. It's best not to move someone unless they are in immediate danger / completely blocking the road. If you have to do this maintain head stability with your hand splint, move them to the nearest edge of the road, and in the direction that their head is already pointing.

8. Don't give a person anything to drink unless they can hold the container and drink themselves.

9. Group rides have a map, so it's easy to give directions to EMS. Get the person's car keys, ID, call an emergency contact or ICE from their phone. Have someone go back to the ride parking lot to drive back and pick up their bike.

The Bluegrass Cycling Club did all of these things to help care for person who was injured on Thursday and it just reminded me of how great this club is.

The other great thing is that they have a secondary insurance provided through the League of American Bicyclists, which helped me out last year in my crash. It saved me over $2000 in medical fees and is a big reason to join and ride with a local club.

That being said, crashes are rare, the more experienced you get, the more likely you are to avoid them. Yes, they happen a lot in Pro races, but these guys are both tired and taking a lot of risks. Just like driving, you can learn to ride defensively. In my opinion, the best thing is to be relaxed and aware of what can happen.

I hope you don't have to deal with this, but hopefully this will help if you do.

Spring Road Racing with Team WHAYNE

So we're two races into the road season and I am having a ton of fun already. The group is very cool and we're already starting to work together.

Our first race was at Long Run Park in Louisville. Being the first race of the season we were understandably over anxious. Several of us made the mistake of being way too active on the front and tried to control everything that moved. We cooked ourselves in the process and by the time we hit the last lap we couldn't organize enough people for the lead-out, plus the train was a little slow since our legs weren't too fresh.

I still managed to take over on the last lap and led for 2/3 of a mile, I was fading fast over the hill when Joe shot out from the rear of the pack and took over. Andrew jumped out from behind me and took Joe's wheel, and since we were headed downhill I dug deep and got on Andrew's wheel. 

Andrew was telling Joe to"Go!"  but he misunderstood and pulled off. Andrew was left with an 800 yard sprint, so he jumped and I faded off his wheel; completely spent. I watched as he opened up a 10 bike-length lead, which he held until about 10 yards from the finish line where four guys edged him out and off the podium.

So Andrew narrowly missed a win, but still held on for 5th. Not bad for our first race, but there were many things for us to work on.

Next up was another circuit race in Lexington. This course, at Coldstream, was like a Nascar race - wide open, fast, and only one easy corner. Our plan was to be less active early in this race and save ourselves for the sprint. Only problem was the other teams had the opposite in mind and went for the early break. I didn't chase it down this time and sat in while others did the work.

A break did form with Greg in it, but he did a lot of work to get in it and didn't last long before he fell back to the pack. The break included some strong riders so I decided to try and bridge up to them before it got too far away. I brought them to within a few seconds, but it was windy and they didn't want me in the mix. So every time I'd get close they'd hit the gas and I'd lose the ground I had gained. I tried for about 10 mins before conceding and I fell back to the pack to recover for while. Three laps in the wind had hurt, so it forced me to regroup and loose track of what was happening at the front.

Joe made a good attempt and got away with a few others for a lap before they were also brought back. At this point there was a lot of confusion, one break had been brought back, but everyone lost track of the original group that was still slogging it out off the front. So the pack stopped chasing and we focused on grouping up for the final laps.

Sean made a great flier in the final laps putting in a strong effort and taking the pressure off us as a team to set the pace. We moved to the front with three to go, turned up the pace with two to go and by one to go we had a nice train organized with six riders setting the pace.

With half a lap to go Greg rolled off, having done a lot of the work to hold our position. I pulled us through about 400 out, Andrew took over with Steve H., Doug, and David Rose on his wheel and they were flying at this point. He dropped them off giving Doug the field sprint and had enough steam left to cross the line right behind him. It was beautiful, the field was strung out and there wasn't much the other teams could do about it. We took first, second, and fourth in the field sprint.

Doug thought he'd won, but we really got 5th - not a good feeling. It's funny how long it takes to sink in when you're on a high like that. We didn't win, but we were really excited about how the lead-out worked, and about our progress from last week. The process was great, the product will come.