Biker-Deer crash

This is a bike story too good to put on hold. I’ve asked the author of this – George Ingram – to register and post it on our Ride Report Forum under Community but I have to share it here.

This happened yesterday. George was with a group of riders who did a century ride – 100 miles – starting from Stony Creek Metro Park. In fact, as our BikeFitness.net regulars were doing our 50 miler yesterday, we came across George and his group, who were just setting out.

What follows below is George’s report, sent in an e-mail. Again, I’m hoping he’ll post this himself on our BikeFitness.net/community forum, under Ride Reports. But here it is:

On the way to Stony Creek the weather was not so good, I needed to use the windshield wipers several times for the light rain.  With the weather forecasters and various Internet web sites predicting 50% chance of rain from 11 PM through dinner time, I thought than the plan to do a 100 miler to North Branch would be put on hold and we’d do single tracks in the park.  I was wrong.  The North Branch 100 was still the plan.  If I would have know we were doing the 100 miler for sure I would have ridden my Trek which is well broken in.  Since I incorrectly assumed we were doing a shortened ride due to the rain, I brought my brand new Gary Fisher that I only rode 4 miles before I snapped the chain in half and went head first over the handlebars into a mud hole. Oh well, this would be a good chance to see how I liked the new bike.  The first real ride would be 100 miles long.

We started out of the park with eight riders – TJ, Steve Whitty, Eric, Phil, George L, Rick J, Bill D and I.  Dave Heilbrun was in the West Branch parking lot to send us off.  Mike Wendland rode through the parking lot with his group of riders just before we left on our journey.  I’ll let TJ describe in a separate e-mail the route he lead us on.  At 2 hours out (about 25 miles or so) Rick Jones and Bill Dyker turned back to Stony Creek since they both had events in the afternoon to attend.

Just south of North Branch is the Paradise Lake Ranch where they have a herd of buffalo that can be sometimes seen inside the fenced area.  They were hiding on us again today.  Two weeks ago we went on the east side of the Ranch and did not seen any either.

On the return trip down N Fives Lakes Road in State property we came up on a gentleman in a small covered wagon being pulled by two ponies.

Then we were heading south on Hosner Road just north of Dryden Road when we had an incident that never happened to any of us before.  George L. was racing Steve Whitty up a hill at about 20 MPH when a deer was running across the road exactly perpendicular to them.  The deer saw Steve and swerved to miss him but went right into the side of George who was just a bike length behind Steve.

The deer jumped into the air to go over George but hit him full force in the shoulder and ribs.  There was quite a thud upon impact of the deer on George and another couple of thuds as both the deer and George hit the ground.  Tthe deer went down hard an the dirt road just inches away from Eric.  George landed on his head and the deer skidded on her chest.  George was shaken up very little considering how hard the impact was.  He cracked his helmet up quite a bit but his body had almost no road rash or scrapes.  We made him stay down for a couple of minutes to make sure he was OK.  He was able to ride the 40 miles back but it was with some pain.  Sunday will most likely be quite painful for him.  We each told him what to take for the pain (Whiskey, Brandy, beer, …).  It must be nice to have so many friends help you get better, right?

Here is George’s helmet -  he landed on his back and his head on the road.  Notice that even the hard shell on top is cracked.

As soon as George and the deer skidded to a halt, someone yelled “look out for others” since you rarely see one deer crossing the road.  Sure enough, back up the road a fawn went racing across the road very close to Phil and TJ who were riding in the back of our pack.

We stopped in Leonard for more liquids at a party store and took the familiar roads back to Stony Creek.

I finished with 100.5 miles, 13.4 MPH average, burned 6,183 calories, spent 7 hours and 30 minutes on the bike seat, climbed 4,195 feet,126 average heart rate and an average cadence of 76.  Use this link to see the detailed route.
http://connect.garmin.com/activity/7109497

Happy Trails to you, until we meet again.
George

Told you this was a good story! I’d like to know… what happened to the deer? And how is George feeling now?

And for anyone else on the rode, please post tis account, with your extra details, and any other photos, in the Community Forums. To post, you need to register on the site (that keeps away spammers)… all registrations go straight to me… just sign up and give yourself a password. I’ll get an email that you’ve registered and I will immediately activate you.

Then post those reports and pictures. On the form where you write the report there’s an area down below to upload a photo. It’s pretty straightforward. upload one… then the others… as many as you want.

I’d also love to get the full route. Sounds like a great ride. Looks like fat tires are needed.