Injured cyclist stresses safety measures

Cruising down Emigration Canyon at speeds approaching 30 and 40 miles per hour, Steve Ferguson was in his element. A former pro-level cyclist in his younger days, Ferguson is hardly a stranger to being in a bike saddle.

But on that fateful day back on Sept. 25, Ferguson did not see the debris in the bike lane.

Without knowing what was happening, Ferguson was thrown from his bike and toward a large rock on the shoulder of the road.

"I went from 30 or 40 to zero in about one second," Ferguson said. "I hit that rock and just stopped."

The bike helmet Ferguson was wearing is now cracked open from the front to the back. He keeps it around as a reminder of how lucky he is to be alive.

His helmet, though, was not the only thing broken. Two days after the accident, Ferguson was in an operating room at University Hospital as surgeons repaired the broken vertebrae in his neck.

Months of rehab and a second round of surgery to remove some painful bone chips will allow Ferguson to join his bike-racing friends at criteriums and on the roads.

His story, though, is a reminder of something most serious cyclists rarely forget — bike safety is serious stuff, especially in the winter.

"Just like driving," Ryan Barrett, also a former pro cyclist who still logs hundreds of training miles per week, said, "you have to give yourself extra time and space. There's a lot of hidden dangers out there."

Barrett is still a competitive racer and is the reigning Utah State Road Race champion. Even during the coldest months he gets together with several of Utah's top cyclists for training rides.

On a recent ride, Barrett said all it took to wipe out half of the eight riders in his paceline was a small patch of ice.

"Once one person went down, everyone behind him went down, too," Barrett said. "But that's cycling. We know to be a little more careful out there. But that doesn't always keep you from crashing."

Ferguson may have done nothing wrong, but a few rocks in the middle of a designated bike lane — Ferguson investigated the crash scene the day after his accident and believes an automobile drove illegally off the road and spun the debris into the bike lane — left him lucky to be alive.

"I know I could be dead right now," Ferguson said. "It just reinforces that we have to be careful out there. Even when we're in the bike lanes, we're still at risk."