Cornering Fail

[metalheart]

So, I am out on my ride this morning on a local bike trail (ARBT), which is nicely paved with a decomposed granite shoulder. The trail is dry and clear and it is about 85-90 degrees. I am going 18-19 mph and coming up to a sharp bend, the first in a short "S" curve and behind me I hear the whirr of carbon wheels. Just before I get the the sharp bend I hear the fellow call on "letf" and he passes.

Right as he hits the sharpest part of the curve I see his wheels slide out and he hits the deck hard. I called out and asked if he was ok. I think while he was still sliding when he replies something like, "Yeah fine." The thud when he hit the ground made me think otherwise. I kept pedaling on but began to think about why he went down.

I think he was leaning into the corner and his hard pedaling on the downstroke caused his rear wheel to slip. If he had not been pedaling hard at the corner I don't think he would have gone down? What do you think?

[thwart]

Pedal strike... ?

Think I would've gone back to check on him myself.

[weisan]

Metal heart pal, did you really have a metal heart?

yeah....I agree with thwart pal, should have trusted your own judgement and stopped to check. A lot of times I hear folks said they are OK, especially right after the impact, to save themselves the embarrassment and just a knee jerk reaction or adrenalin rush...when in fact, they are not. I mean, how would they know, it happened so fast. Until the dust settled, when they are able to take stock and do a system check, there's no way to know. Even then, some issues may crop up days later.

[cadence90]

+1 thwart, +1 weisan.
The courteous thing to do is to stop and check, at the very least.

[metalheart]

Ok, it is not as bad as it seems. I started to slow and there was a group of several riders coming the other way and I warned them there was a rider down and to check on him. All of this happened within a few seconds, so he had plenty of help if he needed it with the group coming his way. It would have been risky for me to try to make a turn with the group coming and I made a split decision that if he needed help other riders were right there and in a less risky position to help than me.......... I have done more than my fair share of helping out other riders in distress and this was just one of those cases when someone else was in a better position to help than me. The issue isn't that I did not stop, but what made him go down. Pedal strike is a possibility, but I did not hear or see that happen, but then it all went down very fast.

[ultraman6970]

There is a possibility that the OP is right and if he heard like a metal sound then that could confirm it. Common mistake.

Many people dont know how to take curves and they get the wrong pedal down, in my area i dare to say that maybe 90% of the riders have not figured it out or dont pay attention to what other riders do. Many people if they dont have a magazine or a manual to tell them what to do they cant figure it out.

[AngryScientist]

may have been a pedal strike, but otherwise the reality is that road bike tires have very little contact patch with the road. there are multiple ways to fail at cornering hard. tough to determine what may have been the cause in this instance.

[cachagua]

...I think he was leaning into the corner and his hard pedaling on the downstroke caused his rear wheel to slip. If he had not been pedaling hard at the corner I don't think he would have gone down? What do you think?

Disappointed! I was hoping for video.

To answer your question, though, I don't think it was his "hard pedaling on the downstroke" that crashed him. (Note that this is separate from pedal strike.) I believe he would probably have gone down even if he'd been coasting. In motorsports it's not uncommon to break a tire/tires loose when the sum of cornering force and accelerative force exceeds the tires' adhesion, but that's not meaningfully possible on a bicycle. I think the guy plain old overcooked it.

Were you cornering fairly hard yourself? He passed you...

[merckx]

Ok, it is not as bad as it seems. I started to slow and there was a group of several riders coming the other way and I warned them there was a rider down and to check on him. All of this happened within a few seconds, so he had plenty of help if he needed it with the group coming his way. It would have been risky for me to try to make a turn with the group coming and I made a split decision that if he needed help other riders were right there and in a less risky position to help than me.......... I have done more than my fair share of helping out other riders in distress and this was just one of those cases when someone else was in a better position to help than me. The issue isn't that I did not stop, but what made him go down. Pedal strike is a possibility, but I did not hear or see that happen, but then it all went down very fast.

Classic diffusion of responsibility.

[cadence90]

Exactly.

[m_sasso]

Classic diffusion of responsibility.

Yes, likely if you would have stopped, with a small bit of discussion between him and yourself you could have a definitive answer to your question as to why.

Possible the group thought you were going to stop and also kept on riding?

[FlashUNC]

Follow up thread tomorrow:

"So I found a dead guy on my usual loop. Looks like he struck a pedal and washed out in a corner. Scrawled in blood next to the body were the words "he never turned around". I wonder what that means."

[cadence90]

^
Will that thread be titled "Dead guy fail"?

[Peter P.]

You did the right thing. Once the other rider says they're okay, they OWN it. Move on. If later the rider realizes they actually could have used help, then hopefully they learned from the experience for the next time.

If you doubled back out of compassion or curiosity, that's frosting on the cupcake. Don't lay a guilt trip on yourself.

As to what happened, without seeing an obvious pedal clipping the pavement, they were possibly going too hot through the S-curve. Perhaps they were on target for a Strava KOM, and you know what THAT can lead to.

[cadence90]

Perhaps they were on target for a Strava KOM, and you know what THAT can lead to.

"EPO, Kudos, fail...pick two."?

[merckx]

You did the right thing. Once the other rider says they're okay, they OWN it. Move on. If later the rider realizes they actually could have used help, then hopefully they learned from the experience for the next time.

If you doubled back out of compassion or curiosity, that's frosting on the cupcake. Don't lay a guilt trip on yourself.

As to what happened, without seeing an obvious pedal clipping the pavement, they were possibly going too hot through the S-curve. Perhaps they were on target for a Strava KOM, and you know what THAT can lead to.

I once happened upon a cyclist who had fallen, but was off the floor when I arrived. I stopped and asked if she was okay, or needed help. She shrugged the incident off and said that she was fine. I began to clip in and continue on my ride when she asked me what had happened. I told her she must have fallen, perhaps hit some rubbish in the road. She then said, yeah that's right. I began a few pedal strokes into my ride when she asked me again what had happened. That is when I realized that she was concussed. The fact of the matter is she needed urgent medical care, and I didn't first realize it based on her initial demeanor. I had been fooled. If stopping costs you five minutes from your day, you won't miss them.

[cadence90]

I once happened upon a cyclist who had fallen, but was off the floor when I arrived. I stopped and asked if she was okay, or needed help. She shrugged the incident off and said that she was fine. I began to clip in and continue on my ride when she asked me what had happened. I told her she must have fallen, perhaps hit some rubbish in the road. She then said, yeah that's right. I began a few pedal strokes into my ride when she asked me again what had happened. That is when I realized that she was concussed. The fact of the matter is she needed urgent medical care, and I didn't first realize it based on her initial demeanor. I had been fooled. If stopping costs you five minutes from your day, you won't miss them.
Bravo. Spot-on.

[metalheart]

Context is everything and hasty generalizations lead to erroneous and accusatory conclusions: you were not there, you do not know the entire set of circumstances and in a short post providing all that context can lead to the post not being read.

As I said before, I am a responsible rider, I look out for folks who need help or who are in trouble. This situation was one where a few seconds of determination on my part were, I believe, entirely justified: there were riders behind me and more than one group of riders in front of me. It was avery busy day on the trail. The downed rider indicated that he was ok --- i.e., that he was conscious and had some orientation -- and there were other folks in a better position than me to help him if he needed it. Back off.

I have ridden the same corner a number of times passing other riders at speed and this never happened to me. I could see no fault with what the rider did and I was perplexed as to why he went down. My guess is that he just has a powerful downstroke than me and in the curve it was more than his tires could handle. Enough said thanks to those who answered the question. Context is everything and until you know that, then you are talking out your ass.

[John H.]

You did fine- he told you to move along.
Sometimes the last thing someone wants when they foolishly crash is someone fawning over them.
They just want to sort it out.

[metalheart]

Tp the MODS: As the OP I request that this thread be closed. My reason is that it has degenerated into a personal attack without any benefit to answering the original question about possible reasons this rider went down.

it is not hard these days when riding well traveled routes to identify other riders: I reached out to the rider who went down using social media clues and he is fine other than some severe road rash. He did not need any help and was checked on by others he was riding with. He did nothing wrong, he just had a lot of power in a corner and went down. I wish I had his power and that is the probable reason he crashed, but in the end he is ok and I can sort out with him the reasons.d Geeze........

[gasman]

Closed per OP request.