Ouchies. How embarrassment.

So I fell off my bike today.

I was eastbound on William St and the cycleway was about to end, and I decided to mount a driveway but because the cycleway was quite narrow, I didn't get much of a angle and my wheel slid alongside the driveway edge and my bike fell on its side (left) and I slide on my left side a couple of metres across the footpath.

It felt pretty dramatic (fast and stuff everywhere) and people rushed towards me to check I was ok, but I was more embarrassed than anything, responding "I'm ok, thank you, thank you, I'm ok, thank you, thank you, I'm ok, thank you, thank you".

I visually checked my bike and everything seemed intact, but on getting back on the bike, realised my chain had fallen off.

While I was putting it back on (thank you Sydney Cycleways Maintenance course), a guy came and gave me a tip on how to get the chain back on without getting my hands dirty.

Apparently you move the derailleur to the outside, and then you can just spin the wheel and it will hook on.

I've not tried it, as my chain was pretty much back on when we did it, but something to keep in mind.

I thought I was fine (adrenalin) and it wasn't until a few minutes later on my way home, when things started hurting.

I ended up cycling home at about 16km/hr (which is SOOOOOO slow for me - I usually do 20km/hr) but quite comfortable actually.

Husband suggested maybe I'm finding it difficult to separate my commuting and my road cycling.  But I find that when there's traffic (usual commute hours), I tend to go faster so I'm not blocking traffic.  But when there are less vehicles around (like tonight), I can relax a bit more and ride the speed I like.

Things that hurt (the list got longer once the hours rolled by):

1. left shoulder bruise
2. left forearm bruise - at dinner, husband thought maybe it was a fracture, but with my hypochondria, we figure if it was a fracture, I would be making it pretty obvious
3. right knee bruise
4. left wrist - which is starting to feel worse as the night is continuing

Things that surprisingly don't hurt:

1. head - my head did not touch the ground.
2. left leg - we think my pannier bag (on the left) gave my bike some clearance and prevented crushing my left leg under the bike.

In hindsight, I think the stress of cycling into the city perhaps made me push the confidence level a bit too far.

But I still hadn't worked out how to join the William St cycleway (which ends 1 block before Bourke St) to the Bourke St Cycleway

I think I have to continue on the road (when the cycleway stops) and then slow down and turn left onto the footpath and do a u-turn to cross the road as a pedestrian.  (But I don't like turning onto footpaths because I feel like I'm threatening to pedestrians waiting to cross the road).

I saw another person keep going on the road, turn left off William St (staying on the road), then somehow get onto the footpath and line up behind the pedestrians waiting to cross William ST, like a mini loop de loop.

I'll work it out eventually... but I think it would be nice if there was just one more block of cycleway!!

In other news, a friend saw my photo (above) and said "Look at your quads! When I'm home in December, can I touch them?" which is totally the best compliment ever!