Beverley to Hornsea TPT Gateway

[craigwend]

@PaulSB did you do it?🤔

 

[PaulSB]

@craigwend - sadly not. Everything was planned and booked and then 10 days before we were due to go I was hit by a tractor driver. My bike was written off and I had five days in hospital. I'm recovering but it will be some time before I can ride again, and that's assuming I am able to ride again. There's a question mark on that at the moment but I think I'll be OK, just a question of when.

 

[craigwend]

@craigwend - sadly not. Everything was planned and booked and then 10 days before we were due to go I was hit by a tractor driver. My bike was written off and I had five days in hospital. I'm recovering but it will be some time before I can ride again, and that's assuming I am able to ride again. There's a question mark on that at the moment but I think I'll be OK, just a question of when.

Wow, so sorry to hear. Can't imagine what you've been through. Glad you are able to focus on your recovery at what ever level and at your pace .

 

[PaulSB]

@craigwend thank you. We will probably try again next year.

 

[T4tomo]

Ouch that sounds awful. Best wishes for a full recovery.

 

[HelenD123]

@craigwend - sadly not. Everything was planned and booked and then 10 days before we were due to go I was hit by a tractor driver. My bike was written off and I had five days in hospital. I'm recovering but it will be some time before I can ride again, and that's assuming I am able to ride again. There's a question mark on that at the moment but I think I'll be OK, just a question of when.

That sounds serious. I hope you can recover and get back on the bike.

 

[HelenD123]

PS When I had a serious cycling accident a couple of years I focused on what I could do not what I couldn't during my long recovery and that really helped me. I hope you find a way through that works for you.

 

[PaulSB]

PS When I had a serious cycling accident a couple of years I focused on what I could do not what I couldn't during my long recovery and that really helped me. I hope you find a way through that works for you.

Thank you. This is very good advice which I haven't heard before. As people have expressed concern, thank you all, this is what happened.
I was riding to meet friends and was about two miles from home on a stretch of road I've probably ridden, conservatively, 800+ times.

It's fast, a slight descent and I would have been riding at 30+ and accelerating. I heard a tractor behind, he began to overtake on the end of a chevroned area. As he went by I cursed and thought "that's close." I saw the rear wheel next to my right shoulder.

My next recollection is a young man holding my head, looking into my face saying "It's OK, I'm an off-dury police officer. I want you to keep completely still." I did as I was told.

A witness says the trailer or implement mounted on the tractor was wider than the tractor itself. This is what hit me. I'm told I was thrown left. The bike went under a wheel.

Five broken ribs, broken eye socket, three broken fingers, impact damage to knee, soft tissue damage to arm and shoulder, and some of the finest gravel rash you've seen!

I'm alive, healing and beginning to get myself together again. I will ride a bike again and I very much hope that includes the TPT in 2025.

I've solicitors and two insurance companies chasing the driver and the police are prosecuting. The driver claims it wasn't his fault. I suspect he completely underestimated my speed.

As a friend said "Paul, you always do things with style!" 🤣

I am OK but, yes, it has been a bit crap.

 

[ColinJ]

Yikes, GWS, Paul!

Even though what happened was terrible, it sounds like you were in fact quite lucky because you could have been killed or have suffered life-changing injuries.

 

[HelenD123]

Five broken ribs, broken eye socket, three broken fingers, impact damage to knee, soft tissue damage to arm and shoulder, and some of the finest gravel rash you've seen!

I see lots of physio in your future. Do the exercises and trust the process. Some of your injuries will heal pretty quickly, some will see steady progress, others may feel like they've stalled then suddenly improve or not. The body is a strange and wonderful thing.

Here's to you being back on the TPT in 2025. By coincidence the section from Selby to Hull was my first sort of tour post accident.

 

[PaulSB]

I see lots of physio in your future. Do the exercises and trust the process. Some of your injuries will heal pretty quickly, some will see steady progress, others may feel like they've stalled then suddenly improve or not. The body is a strange and wonderful thing.

Here's to you being back on the TPT in 2025. By coincidence the section from Selby to Hull was my first sort of tour post accident.

Thank you.