First Proper Accident
I consider myself a defensive rider and driver – watching for signs other drivers might behave erratically or not be paying attention, anticipating risky situations and trying to mitigate that. If I spot a car approaching from a side roads I look for an indication they’re going to fully stop and have also seen me (i.e. has the driver looked in my direction and started watching me) otherwise I stay especially ready to brake/evade, when riding in cycle or bus lanes I always assume there’s a high chance drivers will not adequately check or give way appropriately before turning across them, etc.
For my first two years back cycling I was fortunate enough to not have any close calls (granted, those cars turning left across bus lanes/cycle lanes could have easily taken me out if I’d not been mitigating the risk). The only time I came off my bike was a slow speed short slide on my side on the Thames Path after one wheel caught a path edging stone in damp conditions and pitched me over sideways resulting in a grazed knee and elbow (no-one else involved).
But on the last day of January 2026 I got driven into while I was out for a ride on my Pinnacle Neon Two.
One of the routes I enjoy riding is taking the towpath along the Oxford canal up to the A44 and then cycling along the shared-use path (which is part of the NCR 5) towards Woodstock. On this day I visited a pub in Kiddlington for a half pint and took the canal route up to the A44 before cutting across from Yarnton to Kiddlington. The ride there was enjoyable and uneventful and I had a lovely half pint of beer at the pub while reading my Kindle before setting off on the same route back.
Most of the A44 from Oxford to Woodstock has a shared-use path along side it that is part of NCR 5 however there is one little stretch in Yarnton where the shared path has a break for a stretch of residential road that runs parallel to a dual-carriageway section (fully separated by a verge) and cyclists use that residential road. There’s a short one-way slip road from the A44 northbound for cars to get on to this two-way residential road and immediately after that slip-road is a BP garage followed shortly by a cut-through junction in the verge to rejoin that northbound lane. I’m always careful to watch for drivers exiting the BP garage as most drivers exiting are wanting to use the cut-through to rejoin the dual carriageway and so their attention will split as they turn right into the cut-through. If it doesn’t look like they’ve spotted me I’ll slow right down.
On this day I was cycling about 14-15mph southbound on the resident road and as I approached the cut-through there was nothing moving out of the garage. Unfortunately when I was about half way across the cut-through junction a car exited the garage and travelled diagonally across the road directly to the cut-through into my lane (rather than doing it as a two step “join road, turn to junction” manoeuvre which cars usually do) and hit me. I remember being aware of him just as he exited and thinking “his road position is rather close to me” and then my next memory was realising he was actually driving at me my braking and steering left to avoid him wasn’t going to be enough to avoid the impact. Next I found myself sitting on the ground with my ears ringing and everything sounding a bit quiet for a couple of minutes with pain in my right leg. The driver did stop, check on me and stay with me. He also apologised and admitted fault (he was looking at the dual carriageway and not treating this road as two-way) and then gave me and my bicycle a lift home.
He’d hit my right leg and the right side of my bicycle (crushing my leg against my bicycle) with the front right of his car sending my bike sideways and me into a forward somersault landing on the adjacent verge (the BP garage had CCTV footage which a police officer retrieved a week later). Fortunately I didn’t sustain any fractures but my right leg was very bruised and sore (it swelled up noticeably) and had a 6cm full-thickness laceration on my inner thigh where the impact had driven my leg against something on the bike (the laceration had to be sutured with both internal and external stitches). Walking was quite uncomfortable for a couple of weeks, I had nerve pain and back pain at nights for 3 weeks messing with my sleep, I had some tinnitus (which has persisted) and it was about 3 weeks before my leg and knee recovered enough to be able to tentatively start cycling again using the Marin (although I still had discomfort around my knee and the healing laceration during rides for a number of weeks after that). As of writing I still have mild tinnitus, some numbness in the skin around my knee/shin, scarring, pain with pressure on the knee when kneeling and the knee joint is still not 100% back to normal (although physio sessions have been improving the joint).
I initially thought the Neon Two was repairable (wheels only slightly out of true, rear derailleur hanger slightly bent, minor damage to some accessories) but on closer inspection I realised the rear triangle of the frame was bent out of alignment. The consequence of this was the rear wheel was not pointing straight and since it’s an aluminium frame it will have been weakened by the deformation and realignment attempts would weaken it further. Since the amount of deformation was relatively small and there were no visible cracks I toyed with the idea, if the driver’s insurer didn’t want the damaged bike, of trying re-dishing the rear wheel enough to make it rideable to then potentially use for just riding into the the city centre (as it would be no great loss if it got nicked), but I learned that heat-treated aluminium alloys which get weakened through deformation are at risk of failing without warning when under load and so it would be dangerous to ride.
Return to Drop Bar – Cannondale Topstone 0
Prior to the accident the YouTube algorithm had started suggesting a few bits of cycling content to me. I had no interest in bike racing but occasionally it would suggest content about bicycle accessories/upgrades that eventually lead to me regularly watching The Wild Ones podcast from CADE Media. It’s good fun as te three main presenters – Francis, Jimmi and Emily – get on really well together, are enthusiastic, have a laugh and often get side-tracked on to non-cycling stuff too. Their focus is on road and gravel bikes as that’s what they’re most familiar with but they’re passionate about as many people as possible enjoying riding bikes (including electrically-assisted bikes). Anyway, their content about drop-bar bikes had started to get me thinking about getting a drop-bar bicycle (in addition to my hybrid and MTB) as I’d been doing increasingly longer rides and figured one might be better suited than my hybrid.
Pre-accident my musings had been leaning more towards a road bike – I’d learned a bit about gravel bikes from the podcast but since they are a relatively recent and more niche style of bike they were rare on the local online marketplaces and the few that did come up were way over the budget I had in mind (especially as I wasn’t sure how well I’d get on with drop-bar after all these years). I figured that because I had the Neon Two for mixed-surface rides then having a road bike with skinny tyres would be ok as I’d only use it for long road-only rides. However after the accident knackered the Neon Two’s frame I now needed a replacement bike that was comfortable for reasonable distances whilst also handling occasional mixed surfaces so I had the dilemma of whether to replace it with another hybrid (and then get a road bike at a later date) or replace it with a drop bar.
As luck would have it a secondhand gravel bike came up for sale locally in a frame size which ought to suit me and, while the price was a little higher than the budget I’d had in mind, it could of course handle mixed-surfaces at the same time as delivering me a drop-bar ride. I went and took a look at it, had a brief test ride and bought it!
It’s a 2021/2022 Cannondale Topstone 0 gravel bike in “Champagne Gold”. It has an alloy (aluminium) frame with a full carbon fork and at the time it was Cannondale’s highest specified alloy-based gravel bike (they did have a more expensive carbon frame-based variant too). You can read more about it here.
Adjusting to riding a drop-bar wasn’t too bad. Getting the right saddle and handlebar positions took a little bit of trial and error but I got it fairly comfortable. I am loving riding it and have been very happy with the choice. Thanks to a spell of sunnier weather I clocked up 65 miles on it during my first week of ownership and went on to do 300 miles in total for the first full month of ownership and 350 miles total in the second month and then again in the third month.
More Drop Bar – Trek Domane AL 2
I found myself reluctant to leave the Cannondale locked in Oxford city centre despite having a decent lock (Litelok X1) and insurance – there’s still the risk parts might go walkies or someone could scratch or dents while locking their bike up next to it. I ended up using the old Marin for visits into the city centre with its weight and geometry it’s not very suitable if I want to go for a longer ride where I include the city centre as a stop-off. With looking ahead to winter I also wasn’t sure I’d want to subject the Cannondale to winter road salt.
This lead me to start contemplating buying another bike for city centre/depths-of-winter duties – for those occasions where the Marin wasn’t suitable – a bike that was more entry-level (i.e. cheaper) than the Cannondale. Ideally a bike that was not too pristine looking, not too showy and so less attractive to thieve. With my experience of working on my bikes myself the past couple of years I felt more confident buying another used bike that hadn’t been serviced in a while (as long as the frame was good and the price was right).
I had the choice of getting another a hybrid to directly replace the written-off Pinnacle or a second drop-bar bike. The Cannondale is fulfilling the go-anywhere role the Pinnacle was (in fact doing so more capably), I actually don’t ride properly off-road that often, and I find myself preferring drop-bars for any ride that starts to get near 10 miles or more – so getting a second drop-bar bike made most sense. Since I would be unlikely to get a second gravel bike for the budget I had in mind that left road bikes as the choice. I find the Cannondale’s riding position is still a little stretched for me so I would be looking at endurance road bikes (and an added plus of endurance-oriented road bikes is they often have pannier rack mount points where sportier ones don’t).
After watching the local marketplace adverts for a couple of weeks seeing a lot of bikes that were too sporty, too pricey, the wrong size eventually a couple of potentially suitable options came up. A Boardman SLR 8.6 in medium size that was in almost new condition (immaculate paintwork) and a more well-used Trek Domane AL 2 (with some minor paint chips/scuffs) in large size. Both rim-brake, alloy frames, carbon forks and the Claris 2×8 chainset/shifters. On the face of it the Boardman was better value as it wouldn’t need any servicing/parts (and I’m not fussed about brand), however looking at the geometry of both the Boardman would be more aggressive than my Cannondale and the Trek a little more relaxed. I went to see the Trek first and although it would need some attention due to lack of servicing, the lack of chain/chainring wear suggested it actually hadn’t done big miles (the seller was a student who’d taken it on a bike packing trip and I suspect that’s where it had picked up many of the cosmetic chips/scuffs). The riding position felt good, so I bought it.
It’s a 2021 Trek Domane AL 2 Rim in “Gloss Mulsanne Blue/Matte Trek Black”. It has an alloy frame with an alloy steerer mated to a carbon fork – it’s Trek’s entry-level endurance road bike. My initial plan was to add a pannier-rack and mudguards, touring-style like my other bikes. But I’ve decided to further differentiate it from my gravel bike by keeping it light – the base weight of both bikes is similar from the factory, but the wider tyres, sturdy pannier rack, dropper post and mudguards all add a bit more to the Cannondale. I figure I can get away without a pannier rack on the Trek if I don’t use it for rides where I want to take my camera, instead I can just use a saddle bag big enough to take my Kindle, phone and repair kit. I will still get a set of mudguards for when the roads are damp but I’m looking at the Crud Roadracer Mk3 set which are very light and really easy to take on/off (and require minimal clearance as I want to run 28mm tyres).
After spending a few hours putting attention on the most important things that needed sorting I started taking it for a few rides over the following days (with flat pedals/trainers), including a 16 mile ride, and was happy with my choice of bike. The Claris 2×8 gearing is the same as I had on the Pinnacle so I’m used to it and although the smaller jumps on the 11 speed cassette on the Cannondale are nice, I don’t find the slightly bigger jumps an issue. Climbs over 7% will be a struggle though if they’re anything more than brief – the lowest ratio on the Trek is 1.06 vs 0.88 on the Cannondale and on the brief climb I’ve tried at 8%/9% I started to run out of steam. Although I could swap the 11-32T cassette for an 11-34T cassette to help a little (which I’ll weigh up doing when the chain needs replacing as it’ll need a couple more links).