Thread: What's more dangerous... Road biking or DH mtb

Originally Posted by marshalolson

way too much speed into a rock garden

Mmmm. That sounds fun. I can't wait for some lift laps.

Originally Posted by Benny Profane

Most roadies I know have never been down, and the rest just wind up nursing road rash and bruising, although I know of one broken hip.

Every year several road cyclists are hit and killed in the SLC area, I can't recall a MTB death ever making the local news. We've covered this pretty well at this point, it boils down to:

DH: High probability, low to moderate consequence (generally)
Road: Low probability, high consequence

Pick your poison.

Originally Posted by Benny Profane

I'll bet that, if we put all the cyclists from this forum into a room, the DH dudes would have the most injuries. Most roadies I know have never been down, and the rest just wind up nursing road rash and bruising, although I know of one broken hip. Now, riding down a mountainside as fast as you can with abandon, well....

This is true but I bet the DHer's wont have any buddies who died DHing, while I bet all the roadies will know at least one person killed or seriously injured.

Originally Posted by LeeLau

Originally Posted by Summit

I'd bet road biking wins for deaths per user day and overuse injuries per participant.

I'd bet that DH wins for non-mortal trauma per user day.

Some surgeon at Lions Gate Hospital in Vancouver did that very study and the numbers were pretty much what Summit said

You wouldn't happen to have a copy or know how to find out? It sounds like an interesting read...

Road biking is also allegedly not so great for your bone density...

Originally Posted by marshalolson

you could literally get hit by a car every time one drives past you.

Thankfully that's just about the least common type of collision. Stats I'm finding (which seem to be different in every article/paper) put a rider hit from a car coming from behind at about 5% of the total. Mostly it's getting turned into or the rider doing something they shouldn't like riding on the sidewalk, the wrong way, running a light, not using lights at night etc. So on a road bike you are making those same decisions about riding safely and minimizing risk. When I ride across town I can either take the busy street with lots of intersections, traffic, and higher speeds, or I can take the road along the train tracks that is practically deserted and has no cross-streets.

I actually got knocked off my road bike the other day thanks to a 16yo girl not paying attention and turning right into me (I'm fine, bike is fine), which is probably the most common thing to happen.


I would expect that injuries per mile ridden is higher for DH riders.

Originally Posted by jamal

I would expect that injuries per mile ridden is higher for DH riders.

Road bikers tend to ride a lot more miles.

Originally Posted by Dickeymotto

This is true but I bet the DHer's wont have any buddies who died DHing, while I bet all the roadies will know at least one person killed or seriously injured.

Nobody killed, just one broken hip. Again, relative to hours and miles ridden, there's not much of a comparison. Fuck, I'm not doing it for the thrills, just exercise. If deaths were that rampant, I'd save my body and luck for skiing.

Originally Posted by jamal

Thankfully that's just about the least common type of collision. Stats I'm finding (which seem to be different in every article/paper) put a rider hit from a car coming from behind at about 5% of the total. Mostly it's getting turned into or the rider doing something they shouldn't like riding on the sidewalk, the wrong way, running a light, not using lights at night etc. So on a road bike you are making those same decisions about riding safely and minimizing risk. When I ride across town I can either take the busy street with lots of intersections, traffic, and higher speeds, or I can take the road along the train tracks that is practically deserted and has no cross-streets.

This is pretty much key. All "road"rides aren't the same. I bike on low density, minimal traffic, smooth surface roads, out of choice. It's why I live where I live. My guess is that the serious and fatal accidents happen mostly on roads that are the opposite.

The best friend of a coworker was hit and killed mid-week on a lonely road in southern UT. Like I said, low probability/high consequence.

Originally Posted by Benny Profane

This is pretty much key. All "road"rides aren't the same. I bike on low density, minimal traffic, smooth surface roads, out of choice. It's why I live where I live. My guess is that the serious and fatal accidents happen mostly on roads that are the opposite.

while riding a horse. If they can't see you on a damn 2000 pound horse, they can certainly get you on your bike. She now will deal with brain injuries for the rest of her life and the 16 year old will have to deal with doing that to another person.

People get screwed up doing both. I've broken a collar bone and arm mountain biking. Road biking has only led to lots of stitches.

Hell, chase cars in races even hit leader groups in the Tour De France. I'll take my chances having to worry about an occaisional moose, elk or skunk every day over distracted drivers running around town on their phones.

Father of a friend is now quadraplegic from a road accident, and there appears to be no car to blame. Nobody is entirely sure what happened, victim has no memory of the event, but best guess is that his carbon fork failed when he hit some minor bump. Helmet didn't crush, the injury was to his spine and most likely caused (according ot the docs) by odd bending forces when his head hit the ground.

There are all kind sof ways to get injured or kilt. Biking, either road or DH is pretty far down the list of risks people choose to take. Enjoy it, be smart about it, and don't worry about it, least that's my approach.

Yeah, life can be a bitch sometimes. Three or four years ago, a dude was riding in a group ride on L.I. on his new carbon Orbea, and, as he came to a stop at a light in the group, his front end broke open (obviously it was probably cracked already), he goes over the bars, into a coma, and dies three days later. One reason why I don't trust plastic.

I posted here last week how I crashed kinda hard that day after my water bottle popped out from a bump and made it's way into my rear spokes. Fortunately, the car behind me wasn't right behind me. Only my second crash in twenty years, though.

Originally Posted by blunts

Road biking is also allegedly not so great for your bone density...

while not relevant to the conversion...
Cycling and other non-weight bearing sports, IN ADDITION to sports with cyclical loading (running) are no bueno for bone density-

Sports with high loads (weight lifting) or constantly varying stimulus (soccer, skiing) are significantly better.

Originally Posted by marshalolson

anyhow, if you don't want to get hurt DH'ing, don't do things you don't have the skill to do. and if you want to continually push yourself, accept that you will likely get hurt occasionally. same with skiing, climbing, kayaking, whatever. if you choose to continually push your boundaries, you will sometimes find that boundary and get hurt. but you got hurt because you CHOSE to hit a specific feature or took way too much speed into a rock garden or something else super dangerous. the difference is that simply choosing to road bike is inherently dangerous. you could literally get hit by a car every time one drives past you.

Like I tell my sons, "There's no way to truly know where your limits are until you've exceeded them."

For me, even more dangerous than DH-ing or straight up road cycling...was riding my 6" FS "all-mountain" bike on the road...'cause THAT's when I got smacked by a truck (from behind, and hit and run no less) that flung me into a ditch and broke my collarbone and gave me a ton of stitches in my thigh.

So don't go all-mountain'ing on the road, it can kill you.

Originally Posted by marshalolson

the amount of danger on a DH bike is mostly up to the rider.

the amount of danger to a road biker is mostly outside the rider's control.

this.

At least if I fuck myself up DHing, its my own fault.

on the road some idiot typing a text while driving could be 6 inches to the left and kill you

I rode a 5 mile, 1,600 ft high speed descent yesterday on rocky singletrack through tight trees and all sorts of exposure and obstacles in the woods. And I did this alone, in a remote area.

I was only terrified for my life on the flat 1 mile section of state road returning to camp. That pretty much sums it up for me.

Originally Posted by marshalolson

anyhow, if you don't want to get hurt DH'ing, don't do things you don't have the skill to do. and if you want to continually push yourself, accept that you will likely get hurt occasionally. same with skiing, climbing, kayaking, whatever. if you choose to continually push your boundaries, you will sometimes find that boundary and get hurt. but you got hurt because you CHOSE to hit a specific feature or took way too much speed into a rock garden or something else super dangerous. the difference is that simply choosing to road bike is inherently dangerous. you could literally get hit by a car every time one drives past you.

I think these sports are just risky, and even if you aren't pushing your limits you can get fucked up really easy.

Every bad crash I've had skiing has been doing something I've done before that I felt (over) confident about. Complacency is death.

Originally Posted by marshalolson

typically that would include either:

1. being cut off by a car and loosing control
2. hitting an unexpected gravel/oil spot on the road and loosing control

MOST roadie injuries other than the 2 above examples are folks trying a crit race and getting tangled with someone or pushed into a barrier.

"have fun with that"

anyhow, if you don't want to get hurt DH'ing, don't do things you don't have the skill to do. and if you want to continually push yourself, accept that you will likely get hurt occasionally. same with skiing, climbing, kayaking, whatever. if you choose to continually push your boundaries, you will sometimes find that boundary and get hurt. but you got hurt because you CHOSE to hit a specific feature or took way too much speed into a rock garden or something else super dangerous. the difference is that simply choosing to road bike is inherently dangerous. you could literally get hit by a car every time one drives past you.

This statement as well as what others have said applies to my situation. My road bike accident was mostly out of my control, while the DH injury was mostly my fault. I was above my skill level (found my boundary... Less than 10 days on a DH bike, I shouldn't be trying this shit). With that said, the biggest mistake I made was not being FULLY committed to the drop. Lack of skill/experience and a hesitation led to injury. I also should have had more gear which would have minimized/eliminated most of the pain.

On a side note, my first ride after my road bike accident I almost got hit again by a SUV running a red light. Stayed off the roads until I moved back to NH.

Good insight, thanks guys.

Give me a 25' gap jump on my DH bike any day over road riding. That shit terrifies me. Same as Tyrone, the scariest moments I've had are bombing down a canyon road after finishing a ride on my trail bike. Idiot cars peeling around corners, distracted, so sketchy.

And then most of us have skiing to put this all in perspective, which generally falls into the road category of "less common little injuries, occasional massive injuries/death." Especially when we're talking backcountry travel... it kind of reminds me of road risk. There are things you can do to mitigate, but sometimes you're just hosed by outside factors (drivers, avalanches).

Originally Posted by Particle

Give me a 25' gap jump on my DH bike any day over road riding. That shit terrifies me. Same as Tyrone, the scariest moments I've had are bombing down a canyon road after finishing a ride on my trail bike. Idiot cars peeling around corners, distracted, so sketchy.

And then most of us have skiing to put this all in perspective, which generally falls into the road category of "less common little injuries, occasional massive injuries/death." Especially when we're talking backcountry travel... it kind of reminds me of road risk. There are things you can do to mitigate, but sometimes you're just hosed by outside factors (drivers, avalanches).

This is a good point. Backcountry skiing for most people typically involves easier actual skiing (less hucks, straightlines, etc) then resort skiing, but has much greater potential for catastrophic accidents. Resort skiing is usually faster and bigger, but usually just results in smaller injuries like ligament tears and such. The real problem in the ski world nowadays is that backcountry skiing is being pushed where people are doing as big or bigger hucks and jumps, but also still have the inherent risk of avalanches, exposure, being stranded without rescue, etc. Kind of the worst of both worlds. Relate that to biking and you would get something like one of those rad urban DH races like they have in South America, only now on a busy street with aggro drivers whizzing by the athletes during their run.

Basically BC Freeriding > everything. I definitely hear of more avy deaths every year then I do people getting hit by cars on road bikes.

road biker: "downhill is more dangerous"
mtber: "road biking is more dangerous"

there are about 700 on-road bike deaths a year in the US (and something like 60 million riders).

It's kind of hard to find statistics about MTB riding injuries but there is some decent, kind of old, info at the end of this article:
http://www.mountainbike.co.nz/politi.../chapter2.html

lots more available about riding on the road
http://www.iihs.org/research/fatalit...year=2008#sec1

Originally Posted by marshalolson

typically that would include either:

1. being cut off by a car and loosing control
2. hitting an unexpected gravel/oil spot on the road and loosing control

MOST roadie injuries other than the 2 above examples are folks trying a crit race and getting tangled with someone or pushed into a barrier.

"have fun with that"

All valid although you could add 3. going wide into opposite lane during a turn, an incident you can even watch frequently on pro tour events minus the opposing traffic. And getting engaged with other fellow riders is even becoming an issue during xc races which has attracted more crowds over the years.

Regarding road collisions although car drivers are getting their frequent bashing here the cyclists definitely have their fair share of fault. As an avid road biker (yes I ride MTB too, no downhill though) I am stunned how reckless and out of control some dudes act on their bikes when hitting traffic.

I agree that overall crashes on a roadie have more often dire consequences and that does not even have third party to be involved.