Crashed
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June 21st 2005, I finish work about 6.00pm. Sunny, dry day and has been for the past week. I leave work, fil up with petrol and head towards my favourite corner/bend in Basingstoke. Nicknamed the AA loop (as it is a 270 degree loop by the AA building) although it is officially the A3010 turning onto the ringway east. It is one of those corners you either love or hate.

I always hit the corner at the same speed and steadily accelerate round it with my knee planted on the ground. The bend is anti-clockwise so my left knee slider always takes a beating. Unfortunately, the council choose the nice sunny weather as the time they want to resurface the road. The corner itself wasnt resurfaced but the stretch leading up to it had been. I had cleared this a while back, but, about half way round the bend (when i am at my peak speed with the bike leant fully over) there is a nice deposit of loose chippings and gravel. No where to go and no time to brake, my back wheel hit the gravel and the bike just slid. What happened next is not clear to me, as when you are flying through the air, you don't really have a look around to see what is going on.


Then you are just lying there, unable to move from the pain. I don't know exactly where I landed but it was somewhere still on the road. At least three people had stopped but the occasional car came speeding round the blind bend until the road was closed off. A big thankyou to the people who stopped, whoever you are, especially to the woman who held my legs in the same position I had landed in. That was a nightmare. I had landed on my back with my legs bent, and they hurt - a lot. Gravity wanted me to put my legs straight but the pain had other ideas. I then had the wait for the ambulance. It seemed like forever. A quick assessment by the paramedics led them to wanting my arlen ness leathers cut off. After a lot of argueing, I believed them about the trousers being beyond repair, so they cut them off. The jacket was fine so I refused to let them cut that off, which led to the difficult and painful job of removing it. This done I was put in a neck brace and stretchered into the ambulance.