Had a close call while riding into work this morning.
I entered a roundabout heading straight. Car on the left doesn’t see me and enters the roundabout as well. I see the car, resist on the pedals hard … start to feel my rear wheel skid alittle and slip to the side (wet road). I’m getting very close the car’s driver side door. I know I’m going to hit this guy for sure so I turn with the car and try not to hit head on. Next thing I know, my front wheel is touching his rear tyre. Amazingly I stay upright and ride out of the roundabout unharmed. Turned around to see the driver go on and a give little wave (apology?).
scary dude! my o crap moment: yesterday, coming down the hill at the bottom of exibition street. light turns red. start a skid and then unclip out of my right pedal! make the left turn into beeping oncoming traffic. didn’t come off or get crashed though…
also pushie cops are doing a blitz on cyclists in the cbd until the end of next week, so be careful–i got a $215 red light fine on tuesday for running a red at little collins(!) coming down eliz. boo.
The car was already very close to me when it entered the roundabout. If I had my brake with me, I would not have been able to brake and turn with the car.
Hard front brake + turn + wet road = slipped front wheel + ending up under the car.
Hypothetical of course … but in this situation I believe that a front brake would not have helped me. Anticipating that the car wasn’t going to see me and reacting accordingly did.
That’s not to say that brakes on a fixie are useless … just depends on what sort of rider you are.
Roundabouts are shit like that. I have to turn into one at least twice a day, to and from work and all too frequently the perception of some drivers seems to be that they have right of way by the simple virtue of being in a car. And when push comes to shove, they do because that’s one big mobile death trap they’re sitting in.
Ah yes … that little inside joke … it’s been so many weeks now, I can’t even remember how it started. I have a feeling that “YeeHaw” was somehow invovled.