Things you remembered before getting injured

I was riding on my motorcycle one night when the guy in front of me suddenly slowed down, set the turn indicator to the right, looked as if he wanted to stop. I slowed down, too and wanted to drive past him when he suddenly swung around to the left and I scored a direct hit with my bike in his door. Fortunately I was very slow, but when I fell off the bike, it seemed as if it took several minutes and not some 2 seconds, and I thought thinks like "Oh f***, this may hurt... no, won't hurt, you're too slow... and you have all your bike clothing.. and the helmet... but the bike... oh crap, it surely is damaged... I'll have to repair it... okay there comes the ground... now let's hope there won't be any other car on the road..." etc etc, was really weird.

 

I like to call it the O-Sh*t moment. Its the time between the accident and hitting the ground.

Most of mine are "O-Sh*t, this was a bad idea..." *impacts ground*

 

lol, i can defiintely vouch for the "o-sh*t" moment, when i was in my major accident (as a passenger) that was the last thing that went through my head, next thing i remember is walking around, screaming a string of profanities that would put any sailor to shame, lol.

 

First time I ever skydived, I braked too late and was hauling ass toward the ground, I remember thinking right before I hit "this is gonna hurt". I rolled when I hit the ground and remember thinking in the middle of the role "I just broke both my legs", fortunately I didnt and walked away from it.

 

I was on "Jungle Tour" in Mexico (near Playa Del Carmen) on a 4 wheeler. The road was sand and rocks, so I began to slide the rear out back and forth (something I had done at home a million times). The tires caught slung me straight into a tree. I flipped over the bars and landed on a giant plant. Just laid there and thought, "WTF?" Then a friend ran over and looked in my eyes and saw I was alright started laughing and yelled to our parents that everything was okay. Of course my mom was freaking out.

 

Back when I was challenging myself skiing, I was looking for steep & narrow. At Mammoth Mtn there is a chute called Hangman's at the top. Decided to try it after a snowfall. There was a fracture line partway down from avalanche control. A guy at the top said it was only a 1 foot drop. Also was overcast making it harder to see. Skiing down, it wasn't where I thought it was, and it was more like a 3-4 ft drop. Typical 'Oh ****' moment. I remember flipping around, sliding on my face headfirst a couple of times, lot's of thunks. I was afraid I was going to hit some exposed rocks. Fell several hundred feet, for those who know Mammoth, maybe 50ft from the top to below the gap behind chair 3 offload station. Fortunately the snow was soft. I think I was knocked out for a few seconds. I lost one lens of my eyeglasses, 1 skipole (buried somewhere), scratches on my face, and one sore body the next day. My ski's and one pole were right up where I fell, fortunately a ski patrolman brought then down for me. I'm sure I provided entertainment for everyone on the lifts.

Counted myself lucky, and I decided to stop going steep and narrow. Decided cruising was more fun. Several years later at Big Sky, Montana. Green run, wide, flat and no one else on the run. Doing some high speed GS turns when I had a minor 'oops' moment. Not the spincter tightening 'Oh ****' like above. Dang snow snake grabbed my ski and I flipped and landed on my head. Broke my neck. Over in a split second.

Go figure. I guess Hangmans still wanted my neck!

 

Happened to me while pole vaulting...was at the highest point of the vault, and the pole just sort of stopped moving forward. Looked down and saw the track and metal box that you plant the pole directly 15ft under me and thought....well, you know . Luckily I landed on the mats....

 

Summer after 8th grade, I went bodyboarding, which was an almost daily happing in the summer when I was little.

I wiped out on a pretty big wave, and while I was underwater, I opened my eyes (which I don't usually do) and somehow just knew this was a bad one.

That's when I heard a loud crack. My leash had wrapped around my middle finger and broken it with a spiral fracture.

When I got up, I tried to close my hand, and that finger went on top of my thumb. I showed the lifeguard and he didn't know what to do. I had to just sit and wait on the sand for about an hour for my mom to show up. Had surgery on it the next morning.

 

Before I did this, I was thinking "Oh ****, this is bad--really bad"

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TP

 

So how did you do that? Not often that a bike just comes apart.....

 

About 4 years ago, I was mountain biking and screaming down a relatively smooth downhill. I remember a slightly funny sensation in my foot, and then I was flying through the air, mostly upside down, still attached to the bike by one pedal. I remember being pissed about probable bike damage, and being mad that whatever injuries were coming would screw up the rest of my summer. Bike was fine, I had broken ribs and a separated shoulder. Turned out my foot caught a small gnarled root at the edge of the trailer hidden in the grass.

 

When I had my motorcycle accident, I hit a guardrail at about 85mph as I slid towards the outside of a turn - this flipped me off the bike. I just remember as I lost the front end being a big angry - sort of "oh you've GOT to be kidding me - no WAY the front should tuck under at this speed, thats bull!". Then I bounced off the guardrail that tossed me in the air - I was doing the superman thing through the air and I just remember thinking "this is really going to hurt - I hope I survive". When I did hit the ground and I was sliding I remember wishing it would hurry up and be over because I was tumbling and sliding for what seemed like forever.

This past summer I was mountain biking - going down a very steep hill to the point where I was leaning back and staying low trying to keep from flipping over the bars. It was a lot of really big rocks on the slope and the front wheel caught one and flipped me over the bars. I was trying to go slow but with such a steep hill I couldn't. I just remember doing a backflip in mid air and seeing the ground was dropping away from me at an alarming rate as I went straight forward, and thinking "dammit this is gonna hurt -gonna break some bones here". I landed flat on my back - totally winded - dog came running over to lick my face , and I was OK - just cuts and bruises.

 

The weather near the summit of Everest is dicey at the best of times. And we were making a summit attempt at night. You couldn't hear anything because the wind velocities exceeded the threshold of pain, and our ears were covered with heavy woolen scarves; frostbite, and windburn at these heights took less than a blink. Our eyes were crusted behind goggles; the temperatures had already frozen the rubber seal to my face mask. The density of the ice below our boots was unimaginable. It had never been anything but ice, for millions of years. It wasn't easy, traversing the ridge below the summit with the wind howling at over 100mph, at subzero temperatures, without oxygen. In the dark.
I felt my left boot begin to slip.

 

The whites of her eyes. She made a right turn on red and I was riding my motorcycle thru the intersection. She hit the gas hard too and came right for me. I braced for impact and drifted to the left to try and miss. I was planning on laying it down by hitting the rear brake hard and sliding. I almost had a heart attack waiting for the impact. And then she missed by a hair. I could not believe it. At first I thought I was dreaming but she missed. After all these years of riding since 1971, I thought my time had come.

 

This happened a few months ago. I was driving home late at night when a deer jumped out right in front of me and then froze right in the middle of the road. And this wasnt some little fawn, it was a big one. Anyways, I slamed on the brakes as hard as I could and I stoped right next to it. Literally it was right by my left mirror. It was so close that if I had my window down I could have reached out and touched it with ease. That was definitely an Oh ****!! moment.

 

Lucky you didn't do that!

No disrespect to you - but I never understand why people say "I had to lay it down" or "I was going to lay it down", etc. Its like knowing a car accident is coming and taking your hands off the wheel to cover your eyes... it does nothing to help and a lot to hurt. A sliding motorcycle has a lower coefficient of friction than an upright one using the tires to brake. In any situation you are ALWAYS better staying on the bike and maximizing your braking.

Everyone who says the "had" to lay the bike down really means "I got scared, locked up the brakes and fell off". There was no conscious decision for those guys to lay it down.

Except that guy who told the story about laying his bike down and sliding under a tanker truck that had crashed in an intersection

Not to hijack, just a pet peeve of mine

Glad you made it out unscathed!

 

Motoring away from the stop sign, we said at the same time - "OH, this is a great song" then, suddenly, the car seemed to fill with light from above and I said, "What is that, a helicopt-?" as it got loud...

303 feet from point of impact into an olive tree, facing the direction from whence we came, we were extracted from my car.

Witnesses said the 4X4 Dodge Ram Pickup rolled and flipped 3 times each after he used the rear end of my car for a ramp... at 100 MPH, plus.

The song was "Rocky Mountain Way."

 

haha...I crashed into a minivan parked in the newly painted bike lane while I was wasn't looking (I was resetting my odometer)

 

Oh, man, you HAVE to continue!

BTW, saw you referred to in Milgrim's IP today...