If you ride your bike long enough you are bound to fall off it in some way.  I have suffered all manner of falls.  As a kid, I was hit, I hit a car, riding across town to meet my parents for breakfast.  I made assumptions that a street closed to thru traffic would not have any cars on it, and so I dove into the corner on my 40lb Huffy mountain bike, and was promptly stopped by a car returning home.  I went over the hood and onto the gravel shoulder, my bike wasn’t so lucky, as it was mangled under the car.  In this case, I was going fast (40lb bikes are a dream going downhill) and it was obviously my fault.

           Falling slow does not sound as dangerous, but often results in injury just the same, even if it is just to your pride.  I have done the unclipping topple or missed the first pedal stroke and fallen.  Although the chance of significant injury is reduced, these falls seem more prone to taking a chunk of skin somewhere off the body.

          By far the worst type of falling/accidents are ones where, as a rider, you are following all of the rules and safety procedures, but due to somebody else’s inattention you still go down.  The short-term pain of the moment is often  replaced with the long-term

pain of dealing with the aftermath.  If you are injured you have to deal with insurance companies (their’s and your’s), often your bike has sustained damage (more insurance hoop jumping), and in extreme cases, you have to wade in the very murky waters of the legal system.  Maybe MURKY isn’t the right word, but without some proper guidance, a person could quickly find themselves drowning in paperwork, or worse.

           Thankfully this has not happened to me, but it could, which is why a post I saw on Fast Company a couple of weeks ago really grabbed my attention.  The post was about a Boston lawyer that noticed in many bike accidents, there was not enough information after the fact.  It is common place to get out and exchange information, and wait for the police to show up, when two steel cages run into each other at low or high speed.  In many bike accidents the rider gets back up, dusts themselves off, makes sure nothing is obviously broken, and rides off.  Only later discovering something is wrong, with the themselves, the bike, or even worse….BOTH.  Although it probably did not happen quite like I remember it, the time I went over the hood of the car and onto the gravel shoulder, I do recall standing up almost immediately, going over to the guy who I had run into and said “I think you hit me.”  He was visibly more upset (hitting a 12 year old kid can do that to a person – not to mention the fact there was blood on my face from a cut above my eye) but remained calm enough to call EMS.  I thought I was fine throughout the ordeal, and thankfully cuts and bruises aside, I was, but I was obviously not in the right state of mind.  The card created by Tim Jacques, has all of the key information you will need in the event of an accident, thereby removing the thinking.  This particular card has been designed for the Boston area, but  Josh Zisson, has/is worked with lawyers in cities around the globe to do a card specific to their area.  If you know a local lawyer who specializes in bike legal issues please pass this article along.

          On a somewhat related note, if you have a few minutes check out the post by Jeff over at BikeJerks from Wednesday.  Apparently a Minneapolis commuter rode up on a couple of guys assaulting a young woman who was also commuting to work in the early morning hours.  Ebbmart (MplsBikeLove handle) was able to scare the guys away and help the young woman out until the police arrived.  I ride on a trail for about 5 miles of my ride and almost never see another soul, and am hyper alert to anything in the woods just outside the cone of light created by my light.  Jeff said it best when he said, Please be VERY CAREFUL on the Greenway at night or early morning, people.