[Closed] What's the biggest cycling injury you've recovered from?

I stubbed my toe a few weeks ago, it was back to normal colour after a week.

Broken Hip learning how not to jump.

took about 3 or 4 months.

I think hopping on the 'bad' leg was the breakthrough for me - I was convinced my leg would just snap off again if I put all my weight on it 😳

Buying a new bike as a 'reward' for recovering helped 🙂

If you've got a number of dfferent issues I'd go and see a sports physio and get some specific exercises/stretches to help.

Fractured pelvis.

I was actually back up and about again reasonably quickly but it took ages to be back to normal on the bike, a year or so to recover to full fitness.

Achilles Tendonitis, which I ignored and ended up tearing my calf. 6-8 months physio I was back on the bike.

Today I have trapped a nerve in my neck! So probably won't be riding this weekend. 😐

Infection in my neck caused by a big crash, was told afterwards I had 24 hours if hadn't had the surgery to remove it 😯 as body was starting to shutdown, kind of puts thing into perspective when you find stuff out like that 😀

The dark spots are broken bones:

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Dave

you're not as tall as I thought you'd be.

I died once. Ok now though 😀

Broke my back ten years ago coming off my bike and going [b]headfirst[/b] into a dry-stone wall. To be more precise I sustained a wedge fracture of my T8 vertebra. Was told that if my spine had moved a couple of millimetres more I would have been paralysed. 3 months of work with a back brace on.

I got a new bike out of it though!

EDIT: and I broke my left wrist last November - plate and screws in forever. It's now about back to full strength.

I got a booking on a skills course (Great Rock 'Stop Crashing' 😕 )out of it though!

I've also got a toenail that wants to fall off, may take a bit more time though.

I got a scratch on my leg from some brambles and got stung by nettles at the same time.

Found some dock leaves for the nettles...so not too bad.

@alfabus - you look skinny.

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Broke the end of my left Tip & fib. too many small bits to screw back together so 6 months laid up. Then a little op to take the shrapnel out of the knee joint.

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broken ribs is my worst and re broken many times since

Look kids jumping of your mates garage roof will impress all your friends but it will end badly 🙄

Ps thanks to the long renthal seatpost in my BMX 80's stylee or my crown jewels would have been pulverised on my back wheel.

s.

@alfabus - you look skinny.

you should also be able to make out that I was desperate for a piss!

Well, in some sort of order, all over bruising, scrapes, strains (amazingly no bone breaks) from getting run off the bike, fractured thumbs and toes, then a plica and torn cartilage in one knee (fixed!), and torn cartilage in the other (still not fixed!). Hence the name...

Over the bars at Gethin dh track. Broken Tibial Plataeu

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Several concussions and a bit of a hurty knee one time...

Snapped my achilles last May then re-ruptured it during rehab had to go in for an op where they took my tendons from my big toe and graffted it on to my achilles still not back on bike but hopefully not to long

Currently into a 6 week 'recovery' from shoulder separation operation. Unfortunately the pain is worse than ever, living on anti-inflammatories and painkillers, and have brought forward an appointment with consultant to later today.

Am hoping that I won't need to be opened up again but am absolutely sick of pain and disturbed sleep. Can't believe what a grumpy girl I've become. 😥

Edit: sorry but am not showing my scar!

Lots of leg ones up there.

Fractured skull and two teeth out.
Broken jaw and another tooth gone.
Broken nose.
(hairnet helmet days)

Ribs, three times.
Broken wrist.
Broken finger, which took ages and was very disruptive. Also left me with a permanently split finger nail - cloven hoof!

crazy-legs

Fractured pelvis.

I've stopped breathing on a few descents 🙂

I broke my coccyx on my saddle. It took months until I could sit properly again. It still feels a bit brittle even now 😐

this talk of weeks/months/[i]years[/i] off is making me feel a bit better thanks

Much appreciated 😉

Broke my wrist and tore my face up.

Rode 12 miles home, had a hot bath and went to bed.

Attended A n E the next day.

EDIT:
4 days off work, which was 150 miles from home.

went over on my hip about five years ago.

Smarted quite a bit at the time but developed into a big sack of puss larger than my hand could cover

3 months later I went over on the same hip - this time it hurt like an absolute ****er - however ther fluid dispered of its own accord

Plum

other people have had it worse I see

Not one specific injury, but hitting a car at about 25 mph led to what I believe is known in medical terminiology as a cluster***k of injuries, which kept me off the bike for about 6 months I think. Don't recommend it.

Fell off back of bike doing a wheelie. hit head (no helmet). Woke up in hospital 4 weeks later. Was told i had 1/2 hr to live at one point during the coma as they were struggling to keep my heart going. The hit to the head fractured my skull and caused minor brain damage leading to tests on brain activity over a period of months. Speach was mildly affected for a while.

Was a long time ago though. Only 4 when it happened, 42 now.

Speach was mildly affected for a while.

<bites lip to avoid making joke in poor taste/>

I did my knee in 2006, didn't really ride again untill 2008. didn't break anything but it just never quite recovered, even now I have to be really carefull about doing too much on it without building up the training really slowly and occasionaly it just packs up mid ride and i have to find a way home and/or stretch it every couple of miles to keep it moving untill I'm home 🙁

Broke my arm in December which was a PITA and still feels fragile even if it has healed up.

[i]Broke my arm in December which was a PITA and still feels fragile even if it has healed up[/i]

Bust my wrist 1st October 2011.
Moving weights in Nov.

You should be good to go, I'd have thought.

If not ?, get it checked out.

Right wrist + right ankle (spiral fracture).

Chicksands 4X track..... sessioning the monster triple!

Crushed two vertebrae first weekend in May 2010 and was Ok to ride on road by about July (short commutes only) . Didn't ride MTB in anger for another two months though. Spent six months stoned, but bunged up on codeine 8)

Broken collarbone, sustained rolling over a manhole cover that had a wheel-sized hollow covered by grass behind it that saw me over the bars in slow motion. About 50 yards from my front door.

The most innocuous fall imaginable, and the worst injury - the only bone I've ever broken. Put the wind up me good and proper, that did. Kept me off the bike for months. Any excuse!

Am just riding again after three months of post operative recuperation, following a Weaver Dunn procedure on my shoulder.

I hit a tree stump hidden in a patch of long grass whilst pedalling up hill and had an OTB moment. There was a loud "crunch" when I hit the ground and that was it.

broke my heal (3 fractures) and a small fracture in my ankle last march/april

rode the megavalanche mid july

had 6 weeks supposedly imobile, but that was hard then another 3 weeks still on crutches
did all my physio stretches with the big rubber bands, commuting to work by bike by week 10 and got swimming as soon as possible

mega was hard as id piled on the pounds and foot was still tender (I knocked it once in the race) probably took a year before id say it was fully healed

Faceplant at 25mph+ ten years ago leading to mild traumatic brain injury (wearing a full facer and armoured up) Witness said I stopped moving for a couple of seconds then sat straight up swearing. Hospital said the, "electricity had probably stopped in your head during those seconds." Guess I died and resurrected! Nowadays I just have to persuade myself I am old and in need of comfort because I still can't go out riding where I get shaken too much or I suffer bad symptoms for weeks after. Guess it's never going to 'heal'.

[i]Witness said I stopped moving for a couple of seconds then sat straight up swearing[/i]

LoL

10/10 for comedy

Collar bone, squidged off a roundabout by a skool run whirling dervish.

Currently recovering from a broken arm. I still maintain landed mostly on my chest though. My chest has only really started hurting properly in the last day or 2; a week after the event. I guess the bruising is just coming out now. 🙁

Road crash descending Mount Etna; I don't really recall what happened I just woke up in hospital a very unhappy confused bunny, but I guess my front wheel washed out seemingly on a straightish bit?? Took the impact on my face breaking my nose, jaw and cheek bone. I lost 9 teeth, and a lot of skin from a variety of parts of my face and body. The hospital did a great job putting me all back together, with pins and some facial surgery to put my bottom lip straight, and after a further nose job and a lot of expensive dental work my new smile is actually far better than my old one. I do tend to keep a bit of a 5 o'clock shadow though as it masks a few of the scars. Rather interestingly they took some skin from just above and to the left of my 'little fella' to graft onto my hand and little finger, and I now get 'pubes' growing from near my left little finger knuckle.

Not a cycling injury, but I only ride bikes because I broke my hip. Used to ride mountain bikes back at the dawn of time but gave up, took to motorbikes and laziness. One morning, fell on some ice while walking, broken hip, bolts through the leg, lots of lost muscle... 4 months on crutches, 6 months of physio and I could walk pretty normally but it gave me a lot of bother, so decided to drag out the old bike and have a go, purely for the health benefits... 2 years later and I was downhill racing 😆 Leg's still buggered mind but it does the job.

Hit a switchback at warp 9 and fell approx 50-60 foot down a drop on an embankment and ended up in a stream.

To this day I don't know where my other shoe went

Broke my collarbone two weeks landing badly after a silly small jump , cant wait to get back on a bike albeit a road one.

Me personally, just 12 stiches in leg from a DMR pedal, and broken ribs from a 4ft drop to head then onto chest.

My wife not so lucky, first gentle MTB ride - broken neck (C2 vertebrate... the hangmans break!), broken wrist, 1 inch gash on lip, major bruising everywhere, broken tooth... All from a forest trail at nevis, loose descent, panic braking then slide off a 5ft bridge into a stream. Was just behind and found her face down, knocked out in the water - If riding alone then I dread to think what would have happend. She made a full recovery with just some scars and lost a fair bit of neck movement, gladly my wife made it out of nevis range forest on a van and then an ambulance trip before they found out the neck was broken... free helicopter trip too.

No MTBing for my wife, but she was always more of a cyclepath kind of girl!

snapped tibial plateau in morzine summer 2009 (crashed on 10% and spd didnt unclip). Had it pinned out there (and now ride flats).

snapped end of elbow (elecronon) off in penmachno spring 2011, taking a tricep tendon with it. Surgery to re attach it all late june 2011. Healed quickly enough to go riding in Spain in September, but still not at full strength (have weight trained for years and no where near back to where I was).

My only holiday photos from 2009.... 🙄

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Dented pride. It still hurts.

Popping out of the woods at "The Canyon" in Les Gets, I somehow ended up off the official trial and ended with a massive steep drop out the woods to see my mates at the bottom, waiting for me.

They beckoned my down so I thought, if hey can, so can I . Anyway, couldn't so bailed before the impassable ditch right at the bottom that nobody spotted.

I ended up in the "dry" ditch with tendons ripped to shreds in my shoulder.

Ends up my mates didn't ride my route either! Gad it happened on the last day of the holiday anyway. Probably NLT missed one run.

That happened early July and I didn't ride again until late September. Just as well, the weather was dreadful anyway that summer. So physically it took the best part of 3 months, mentally probably another 2 years to heal?

Also, trying to jump yers ago, I thought speed = air and didn't know anything about per jumping, unweighting, whatever. I went that fast, I did get air but so much that I landed on the next up ramp whilst heading down, front wheel first. Numous fractured ribs. It only hurt when I laughed or sneezed.

scaphoid - 3 months in a cast - jumping badly
collar bone/ribs/concussion - another 3 months off the bike - jumping badly

I no longer jump.

most random, caught my calf on a broken branch on a log as I rode past, thought ow that hurt, looked down to see the thin red line split open revealing bubbly yellow fat inside. had to ride out of the woods to get picked up. 22 stitches....

Also found a tick on my arm a fortnight ago, so worrying about lymes disease now...

Dislocated and broken shoulder socket last August. Fell off a fikkin log at cannock showing a mate how 'easy' it was. Yes he has it on film. Operation in Sep, very very painful. Back in the bike Jan / Feb tune and lots of rising since. Have been doing a lot of gym work to try prevent reoccurance.

Hurt my balls today.

Not I, but my mate Matt decided to stop using his face right in front of me, on the way down from Hellvellyn. We were with doctors in our riding group - one gave him 20 mins to ive.
He woke up in hospital 2 weeks later, remembered his name a month later....

[url= http://farm8.staticflickr.com/7244/7216679058_940e5b510a.jp g" target="_blank">http://farm8.staticflickr.com/7244/7216679058_940e5b510a.jp g"/> [/img][/url]
[url= http://www.flickr.com/photos/43957750@N02/7216679058/ ]Pelvis[/url] by [url= http://www.flickr.com/people/43957750@N02/ ]eddie.jenkinson[/url], on Flickr

^^^ Is that your knob in the xray. 😕

😆 😯

If you look carefully you can see his 'gluteal folds' too!

Managed this last year.

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I was unconscious for a good few minutes. 6 stiches and plenty of concussion.

I felt ok at the time (so I thought) but its pretty clear from work I had a mild brain injury - couldn't handle stress, couldn't think properly, very forgetful, disorganised. Irritable, troubled by loud noise, unable to focus on someone talking with alot of background noise etc.

Its taken about 6 or 7 months for me to get my original faculties back. Still don't like loud noises though.

Elbow gashed open down to bone - 15 stitches, 9 internal, 6 external. The guy who stitched me up did an absolute beaut of a job - he was a plastics bod who happened to have been roped in for a Friday night shift. The place was full of drunks, so he spent a surprising amount of time getting me just right. The scar was invisible after 6 weeks (we had a baby daughter in the interim). So, I venture out for the first time, slip on a simple bit of wet grass and whack the elbow. A lot of pain, but the resulting bruising discoloured the perfect scar and left me with something more impressive.

Broken ribs six weeks ago - back on the bike after three, OK by four, fine by five.

Double-hard (honest).

Still recovering 7 weeks after breaking both my ulna and radius , two bones in my hand , two fingers , gashing my right arm to the bone needing 10 stitches , various assorted cuts and bruises,

Had three 6" k wires removed under a general yesterday , these where for the distal fracture in my ulna, they were under the skin hence the general and my wound today hurts like murder !,

My radius is healing well but has a 6" Ti plate and a bag full of screwfix self tapers in it, I recon it will be around another 6-8 weeks before I sling my leg over a bike again ,

I have loads of x rays and catscan photos but none have my cock in so no point posting them

Ripped the skin off my knee on the road part of the Gap, knee full off crap kidney infection a week later, pi**ing blood night sweats and just felt like death' not even warmed up 🙁

I broke and dislocated my shoulder crashing in the mountains above Morzine; handlebars also went into my side, which has left a nice scar. I passed out when I crashed and eventually managed to crawl off the track so as not to have other riding landing on me, and then collapsed. Mate who found me thought I was dead. Months of physio and then an operation sorted it out and restored full movement- thankfully.

Currently recovering from broken, dislocated shoulder and torn/repaired rotator cuff. Still very painful and not 'much' movement after 12 weeks post op, however, I can 'hold' arms in handlebar position, and Physio says it should be ok as long as I don't crash (!). Hopefully trying a wee 20min jaunt over the w/e...

Blimey, you lot need to take better care of yourselves!
Only had mild concussion from bouncing my head (yes I had a helmet on) on the road at Sickleholme junction.
Carried on riding before passing out in cafe at the top of Rivelin Valley junction with the A57.
Sweetie of a consultant asked if I had been wearing a helmet, I confirmed I had and his words were:
"Good, or you'd have been clogging up one of my ITU beds!"
Bless!

Stanfree
I hope it's mine

About 12 years ago I decided to buy a cannondale f800 as most of my riding was dh/jump orientated.

On my first ride out (all clipped in and xc'd up to the max) I attempted what should have been an easy 1ft bunny hop up a step to save me getting off to walk over bridge. Epic fail.

I'd put my front wheel onto the edge of the step and had a coming together moment with mr tiggywinkleton and my stem. Cue much moaning and groaning whilst rolling around on the floor.
After 10-15 mins I felt that I could carry on, so I did. Eventually got home and changed ready for a shower where I saw much blood and split ballbag.

4 hours later I'd been stitched up (5 stitches with no anaesthetic) and couldn't work for 2 weeks which led to much pisstaking from my workmates

I have fathered 3 kids since so it does still work 😀

Also dislocated my left shoulder whilst trying to ride No handed and no footed on my paper round one day

Fractured my back (t2) at Innerleithen about 5 years ago. Big drop off, and I must have touched the brakes coming in to it. Nose of bike drops, I come flying off super man style, punch the ground (break a few bones in my hand), land on my head then rotate onto my back. I was a little concerned that my 17 stone friend was right behind me so I scrambled pretty quickly off the trail. Stupidly, I walked down the rest of the trail and Tally phoned an ambulance for me. Boy did I get a bollocking from my wife......

The interesting thing was that it was a rivot in the body armour that pushed through and broke my back, needless to say I wear higher quality body armour now, no 661 for me any more.

I remember being in hospital waiting to get my x rays and some poor sod turned up having fallen off his bike at glentress. His bike stopped, he didn't, and pretty much burst one of his balls open. I was glad I only broke my back.

In my yoof is was into BMX in a big way. Had a few offs and a few bumps and bruises. Them at 16 my grandparents bought me a Raleigh Record Sprint road bike just before I started my apprenticeship. Riding home from college down a big hill, probably close to 35-40 mph, guy in Cadillac coming up the hill turned right in front of me. Slammed into the side of his car and then dragged about 30 feet before going under the back wheel.

All injuries down my right side apart from 1 broken left rib and cheek bone. It's almost easier to list what didn't break. Collar bone, 5 ribs, 3 front, 2 back, dislocated shoulder, elbow, hip and knee. Hyper extension of tendons in right elbow, wrist, knee, broken little finger and big toe.

Only 1 scar above my right elbow, the rest were all mental. I healed physically pretty quickly, although I didn't ride again for 6 years. The long term damage is that my right shoulder grinds and crunches, my right knee is f***ed and I have tendon / nerve damage in my elbow. Similar to tennis elbow. Sometimes struggle to hold a coffee without dropping it.

Someone once said chicks dig scars. Unfortunately not the mental ones.

My shoulder's still not right from a crash I had at the FOD almost 2 years ago. Don't know if I'll ever get full range of movement without pain! I think a break probably would've healed better than the soft tissue damage, think it's the rotator cuff according to internet diagnosis.

Broke my tibia and fibia, which split out through the skin so that my toes toucked under the back of my knee. Did that bailing from a jump. Had an external fixator bolted in for about 4 months and went riding the day it came out and was strong in a month, back to normal in another month.

Last year I had a face break moment. Only part of me with no scarring was my left shoulder, ripped just about every bit of soft tissue in that. Couldn't lift, grip, support weight, sleep comfortably for quite a while. Couldn't ride for about 9 months and when I started again, only for 30min or so. Just about good now, but long rock gardens and steep tranitions still hurt as well as still lacking flexibility.

These things happen.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/wmuecke/7955467006/in/photostream

Not the biggest, but the most recent. This is what happens when you straddle a metal guardrail at speed...with your armpit. Lucky I did not hit any nerves or major blood vessels. Really lucky.

Neat!

I've had a saddle up my arse, split the skin and took ages to heal. Probably not my worst cycling iknjury but defaintely the most embarrassing.

Cycling, worst I've done is ribs/cartileges, broken thumb and broken coccyx. Off the bike, I broke my hip by the head, which was pretty ugly, then shortly after tore the ACL in the same leg. Can't really recommend that... Still gives me bother as you'd expect but it does the job.

http://kittenwar.com/

Severed my palmar artery a few years ago, lost a lot of blood and made a nurse barf when in A&E.

Dislocated my fingers a couple of weeks ago, thinking they'd be ok I did 3 and bit hours on the road yesterday, big mistake.

Complete laceration of the vastus medialis - could see the inside of the kneecap through the cut - until it filled with blood. Nice Helicopter ride to hospital. Surgery. Lots of internal and external stitches. Back on the bike (very tentatively) in three months. All better now and riding (almost) as well as ever this year. Respect to the NHS!

6 months of no riding due to breaking the cashew nut sized scaphoid bone in my left wrist.

3 busted metacarpals in right hand . . . .i was only going about 1 mile an hour . . .fast enough . .

Double fracture to left wrist, scaph and a metacarpal and two fractured ribs.
Apparently was riding around for a month with the metacarpal fractured, but didn't know till x-rayed scaph. Told doc wondered why it was hurting me. Back on bike one week later, ribs didn't let me do much more than gentle fireroads.

http://singletrackworld.com/forum/topic/yertiz-trail-bristol-claims-senior-mtber-in-dropoff-disaster

Busted ribs & two partially detached retinas (right eye still not 100%) Nov '10. Recently - 7 weeks ago? - cracked elbow & chipped kneecap - both still hurt if I touch them just in the right / wrong place

T6 and T7 vertebra wedge fracture plus whiplash landing on my head from a drop (sheer incompetence on my part), and nearly two days in ICU unconscious. Okay they knocked me out apparently while they made sure I wasn't looking at paralysis. No memory of the incident, just waking up a couple of days later wondering where I was.

Torn ligament in shoulder in 2009. It took about 8 weeks. Cause, OTB incident at Les Gets.

Now recovering from a couple of ribs that are stuck. I thought I'd torn some tissue between my ribs but after it not healing for a few weeks I went to the physio.

A couple of bone grinding and popping sounds after a couple of visits sees an improvement but not fully fit. It still hurts to sneeze.

Cause, massive wasp in the full face helmet in Les Arcs.