Wipe Out!

I was running late for work, as usual. I brought the bike out, backpack on, and began the trek to work. I quickly shifted to the higher gears.

I have a slight hill to go down before I make the turn onto Main Street. I saw that I had the green light, so I shifted to 15th gear (the highest) and started pedaling as fast as I could.

By the time I made the turn, I was probably going about 25-30 mph. Work's parking lot is less than 1/4 mile, and I saw that I had a clear turn, so I kept on going at top speed.

As I turned into the parking lot, I had to turn the front wheel hard to compensate for how fast I was going. I didn't have control of the bike, and before I knew it, I'd crashed into a flowerbed, landing on the ground.

Fortunately, I was wearing a bike helmet. After a few seconds, I got up and walked the bike, which was noticeably different in its behavior, to the lamp post and locked it up.

I hurried inside, removed my helmet, and clocked in. One of the managers noticed that the back of my shirt was dirty from the fall and had me change into a clean one.

In the restroom, as I removed my dirty shirt, I saw that I had a scrape on the bottom right side of my belly. I also had scraped a little piece of skin from my left pinky finger.

Throughout the night I had a headache, and, by the time I came home my right hip was feeling sore, too.

As I left work, I saw that the bike chain had derailed. I put it back on the gears and tested it out. It turns out that the rear tire is seriously warped. Also the seat is loose; I had to adjust it while I was riding home.

I mentioned the accident to Jennie when I got home. She encouraged me to put some ice on and take some anti-inflammatory medicine. She also said I should have told my bosses and had them send me to the ER. I didn't think that was necessary at the time.

I'll probably need to get a new back tire. Ugh. I've only had this bike for less than three months!