Tip #26: Don’t cross wheels
2008
Crashing is a fact of cycling but often can be avoided if you have good habits and good handling skills. It’s no coincidence that experienced cyclists tend to crash less than beginners. After years of racing they’ve developed instincts for avoiding danger.
One important habit is monitoring your front wheel so that it rarely overlaps the rear wheel ahead of you. If your wheels overlap and the other rider makes a sudden move
That said, should the paceline slow, there’s no need to slam on the brakes in order to avoid the overlap. Rather than panic and cause trouble, coast and hold your line until you can get back behind that wheel.
Another good habit: Monitor your “outs.” At any given time, you need to know what you’d do should there be a crash ahead of you. Can you escape onto the shoulder? Is there a curb or a driveway you can ride onto? Are you completely boxed in? Then you might want to find another spot to be.
![[ Tour of Oak Brook ]](gr/rideboard.gif)
Feb 11
2008
10:28 am
brian
Funny - I just read a chapter on this very topic in Thomas Prehn’s book, “Racing Tactics for Cyclists” this morning on the train.
Not panicking is definitely key, also staying loose, elbows bent. Drum your fingers on the bars occasionally on training rides helps drill this. But, overlapping wheels is a fact of pack riding so knowing when to worry about it helps too...on the sides, at the front, and in corners - where someone is likely to make a quick sudden move in an attack.
This happened to me at Spring Prairie last year on the last lap, third corner. Luckily I saw it coming - a dangerous move cutting from the right across a tiny gap all the way to the left - I drifted left with his direction, and although we touched wheels it didn’t force me into a sudden new direction. I stayed rubberside down and finished ahead of that rider.
Prehn has some good low speed drills for handling this too.