Public service announcement
DO NOT RIDE IN THE ROUGH GRAVEL BETWEEN TWO RIDERS. You and only you are responsible for your front wheel. If you overlap wheels in rough gravel you are asking for trouble. You should never ride this close, in gravel, between riders. Only ride in the rough gravel (in the middle of the road) to go between the smooth sections. This is really painful to watch because it could have been avoided.
The rider in orange was in the wrong place, riding too close, in the rough gravel, overlapping wheels, and grabbed a hand full of front breaks. This was avoidable.
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I would add… to always have an “exit strategy”. At every point of a ride/race you should be in a place where you can safely swerve away from what’s happening in front of you. In this race I was either on the far right or far left sides, in the smooth section and close to the grass with no riders between me and my exit strategy (in this case, the grass). That allowed me to ride into the grass on the right and avoind this crash, which happened just inches ahead of me.
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Oh that hurt just watching the video.
I love riding gravel, but I definitely always make sure there is plenty of room between me and anyone near me. Unless it is a hard-packed dirt section, I don’t trust that my wheels–or someone’s–won’t slide out from under unexpectedly. I hope everyone involved was ok!
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A few broken bones, but nothing major.
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Yikes! That was terrifying to watch. Glad no one was seriously hurt.
I always keep an eye on my exit routes when riding. I don’t even like to be on the inside of a double paceline on the road because I don’t like to be pinned between another rider and the curb.
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We are taught to take the inside line in a turn always. That’s because when a rider falls, they fall away (out) from a turn. If you are on the inside a falling rider will not take you out. If you are on the outside of a rider, and they fall, they will naturally slide into your wheel and take you out too.
However, if you are riding with inexperienced riders and they disregard your position on the inside of a turn (and turn into you) that is a different story. Experienced riders will not do that (unless they are doing it on purpose to close the door on the dive bomb tactic). If you are riding with inexperienced riders, and they are unpredictable, I would ride behind them, making sure to not overlap wheels. This is not an efficient place to ride but probably more safe.
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