Originally Posted by
MattTheHat
The best strategy is to avoid the crash in the first place. Every time I crash or even almost crash I try to figure out what happened and why. And I spend some time thinking about what I can do avoid letting it happen again.
Yup. learn from your mistakes or end up crippled or killed. I made a lot of mistakes when I first started to ride in seriously bad traffic---with a seriously bad attitude. (For some reason I rode with resopect in my childhood and teen years, when you might expect I'd act out more. I waited until my mid-20s and grew a big shoulder-chip .... breaking both shoulders helped cure that.)
If you got hit, a lot of things went wrong. Not saying you will never get hit when it is entirely out of your hands ... but everybody I know who commutes or has commuted has learned a whole set of actions/responses which are so ingrained they are unconscious ... and which obviate a lot of potential encounters while they are still potential.
No one should ride afraid---fear will keep you from reacting/responding properly, and limit your awareness. But everyone who rides on the road should always be aware that that stuff is Real. Every encounter with a multi-ton metal death-missile is potentially incredibly damaging or even lethal, and while a rider should be a participating actor in traffic, the rider will never win the fight with the motor vehicle.
All crashes hurt.
Originally Posted by
MattTheHat
The only advice I can give as far as actually crash strategy is to try to roll. Sometimes it just can’t happen depending on the type of wreck. If you can roll, though, at least some energy is absorbed. This has served me well on dirt bikes and on one occasion a street bike which decided to part ways with me mid-ride.
I used to know how to roll (a little martial arts dabbling which served well in my actual life) but that only works with flat pedals. If you are clipped in your reactions are constrained. And a lot of the time everything happens so fast .... the best thing to do is get up and get out of the road after it is over.