D’oh.

Not the type of story I like to write, but since I live to see another day, I’ll take it.

Shortened version, I was on my way to work through the Hollywood Hills trying to get a few climbs in to shake the system. If you don’t know, most of the streets are narrow, windy and don’t offer a lot of leeway. I was descending down a road off of Beachwood (I can’t remember which one it was) when I saw a car coming the opposite direction. As my GPS device would tell me, I was definitely moving below the speed limit.

The issue wasn’t so much its speed, but its positioning. The car was veering towards my side of the road and there didn’t appear to be an out. My only hope was to pass the car to my left.

Unfortunately, the driver saw their error and corrected back to the proper side of the road and left me no room to pass on the other side either.

The result: Ciclavalley went over his handlebar and got got pretty good. My right hand was the bloodiest event that ever happened as I had no idea where the bleeding came from. I was also cut on my left palm, arm and knee, but I was just trying to stop the main bleeding.

The pair in the car got out to help and we enlisted someone from the house next door some gauze and more gauze until my hand turned into a mitten. On top of nursing my wounds, they gave me a ride back to the valley.

I took a shower and once I was able to wash away my rouge-ness, the cuts didn’t seem as bad as I thought(but then again, I thought I was sliced up like Kill Bill).

Oh yes, the more serious matter. Can’t say the bike is totally okay, as there were no glaring problems with my ten seconds worth of inspection. The wheels seemed to make a rubbing sound, but I can’t tell yet if it’s the brakes being unaligned or the wheels not being true. I’ll take the she-devil into my local bike shop for a second opinion because I’m just not in the frame of mind to look at the bike yet.

Without getting into more details, I’m just happy not to be seriously injured. Cuts heal, bikes can be replaced, but as long as I can get back onto a bike, there’s always something to look forward to.