Nathan was cycling home from work earlier this month when he was clattered by a deer.
“My route takes me straight up the A38 out of Bristol, crossing under the M5 through Almondsbury then over the M4 before turning off into the darkness down Fernhill to head towards the Old Severn Bridge via Tockington and Olveston," said Nathan.
“I’d descended the first part of the hill and was on a flatter section, so ‘luckily’, according to my Strava records I was only doing around 26mph at the time of the incident.
“Due to recent horrible resurfacing of the outside of some of Fernhill, I was towards the middle of my side of the road at this stage to try to avoid the ‘test track’ new surface that tries to shake my fillings out. Due to the descent into darkness I also had both of my Lezyne front lights (three decent power LEDs) on at this point to enable me to see where I was going (camera quality does not do justice to them).
“I then noticed a car approaching me on the other side of the road and was slightly aware of an unusual noise in the hedge ahead of me to my left. No sooner had I started thinking ‘wonder what that is?’, than the ‘offender’ revealed itself to be a fairly substantial Doe.
“Before I knew it, I was thinking ‘DOH! A deer’, as it quickly dashed in front of me, no doubt startled by me and the approaching car, and took out my front wheel.
Nathan didn’t go over his bars, but landed on his side with the majority of the impact taken by his elbow.
“Unfortunately, as I was in the middle of the road at this point, all I hit was tarmac rather than the grass verge it may have been, if I was more willing to ride at the edge of the road.
“Pain was immediate, and resulting damage was fairly extensive – smashed watch, torn jacket at elbow and shoulder, torn leggings, dented/scratched helmet, displaced front mudguard, damaged rear brake calliper.
“Damage to me was a minor fracture to my left radius (determined after nine hours in A&E), popped/heavily bruised ribs, lots of road rash and a dead big toe nail which is now trying to leave my left foot.
“You’ll all be glad to hear that by the time I’d dragged myself to the side of the road to avoid any following motorists, the deer had long gone, so hopefully only a bit of a tyre mark/bruising wherever I hit her.”
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I heard a government minister on radio today talking about how he wanted people to be pro-active in keeping themselves healthy to reduce demand on the NHS, while they spend a single peanut on the most effective way of helping them to do it. The cognitive dissonance is already straining measurement capability and at it's only their first week.
When I'm cycling in London I know full well when a bus is behind me. If it's not the great big shadow that is cast upon me, it's the aerodynamic 'bow- wave' thrusting from behind that tells me!
Does this mean we'll have conductors on buses again?
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Soundtrack for buses?
Shark theme from Jaws.
Or how about proximity detectors and a loud warning voice in the cab to remind the driver that they are too close behind or beside a cyclist?
I'm dead set against electric vehicles being given fake noises, it detracts from the driver's basic responsibility to be aware of other road users and drive accordingly.
Oh deer!
Cycling UK have also reported back on the requests to candidates to pledge support for active travel. Broken down to each of the 44 now MPs
https://www.cyclinguk.org/sites/default/files/document/2019/12/mps_who_t...
No surprises here eh!
@Nathan - was it a female deer?
Doh!
Oh, dear...
Deliberately driving into a cyclist to get yourself jailed?
At least we're safe from that threat in the UK.