Jacked up my wifes YFZ 450 a little

[Ducman]

We'll its been a while since I've has a shameful ride so I guess I had one comming. Last friday after work I took my wifes 450 to go trail riding and was having a great time untill I was about 1/4 mile from my truck at the end of the day. I was riding about 100 yds back behind a buddy, comming down a narrow logging type road in steep ass mountainous terrain. The road has countless switchbacks one right after the other all the way from the top of the ridge at about 5500' down to the higway that follows the river canyon below at about 2000'. We were having a blast comming down the mountain sliding into each hair pin 180 deg corner, leting the ass end start to come around and hitting the gas at the right moment to get going in the direction of the next straightaway.

 

Well, this one particular coner seemed to have a lot less traction than all the others. I had already slid way to deep into this corner earlier that day and my buddy did the same both times he hit this corner as well. I was hard on the breaks going into this left hander and I wasn't slowing down nearly as much as expected. There was a bad rut and a steep drop off down hill to the right, and the drainage gutter and steep uphill slope to the left. Apparently from examining the post wreck evidence, I slid to the right far enough to hit a rock that stood about 6" tall that was embeded in the road in the gutter. It actually (without popping or knocking the tire off the bead) made a buldge in the rim and egg shaped the bead on the inside, not to mention bent the back side of the lower A-arm. I didn't know things were bent so bad and I still tried to make the corner but the right tire was locked up because the rim was hitting the controll arm. Right front tire locked up going into a left hairpin turn didn't work too well. I expected to turn and kept going straight and now had to panic lock all 4 wheels. The front tires caught on something and launched me and the quad endo style. I sort of pogoed off my head (scrwed my helmet pretty good) while flying through the air inverted and landed on my back. I sat up right away and was amased that my head was still attached and I didn't have any broken bones and I could breath ok. I really dont remember if I was ejected before the quad and I did the first flip or if we flipped together and then I was ejected before a second or more flips. Either way I ended up about 10' in front of the quad and the quad ended up on all 4 wheels. There was about a 10' gap where there were no marks from the spot where the font tires finally caught to the first sign of impact. We then tumbled about another 30 feet from the spot where we hit.

 

The quad only had a bent rt lower a-arn, rim and, bent handle bar on the right. I'm not sure that the bar was bent on the gound or from my body but there wasn't another scratch on it. I don't exactly recall the mid crash events because it was all happening violently fast and I got my bell rung so hard I couldn't see straight except for the cartoon tweety birds flying around my head for about 2 minutes. I got a few scratches from blackberry thorns but I almost ended up going over the edge of the hill into a big patch of backberrys.

 

I guess I was unlucky for hitting the rock which caused the wreck but even more lucky that the quad and I came out with only minor injuries. I have bumps and bruises and the worlds stiffest neck with some musle spasoms, but its fealing better each day. The chiropractor adjusted my neck and said it was just some bruised neck and shoulder muscles. I wish I was riding the banshee so I could finally have an excuse to get +2+1 a-arms and my wife wouldn't bitch me out for jacking up her quad.

 

Live and learn! Guess I needed a little reminder to slow down.

[Banshee~]

Sorry to hear about that....atleast you came out in pretty good shape

[rockgc9]

That sucks. Glad to here your alright though.