What was the bike?
Man, I feel for you. I’ve been in an accident that way… A real ‘no shit’ story. So, there I was, cycling to town on the bike path at the age of 18. It’s dark, but heck, it’s a bike path, and I have a headlight. This is not a road. It’s about as wide as one lane of a road, and it’s on top of a hill, so it’s downhill on both sides, at the point I’m about to reach.
Which is when I see the two headlights coming my way. And realize the engine noise isn’t the highway parallel to me, but coming from straight ahead.
I’m doing twenty, he’s doing I don’t know what. I’m riding a Giant… hm. I forget the specific model, but an early mountain bike. I remember it was vaugely patriotic. A mountain range? A state? It’s a heavy-ass bike.
Somehow, I bunny-hopped the sucker. I could pull wheelies on it, with much effort. I could sunfish a whole half-inch. Hard as heck to do, cause there’s no leverage there, thanks to the wheelbase. But a bunny-hop is when you grab the bike with your knees, and jump the sucker into the air.
If it wasn’t a corvette, I’d have hit it head-on. As it was, I did hit it head-on, but I managed to get at least enough of the front wheel over the hood that I slid, not stopped. Went off the left side. There’s a period there I don’t remember, but from the remaining evidence, the bike went through the window, at least partially, the car went off the road and hit a tree.
Thank god for my helmet, but I was sore for weeks. And the bike was totaled. Both wheels and the frame. (Neck bent.)
No, he didn’t stick around.
Man, I’d almost forgotten about that one.