What is your worst low speed/unexpected crash?

Coasting through a downhill left corner in 2nd gear. Front wheel found a soft spot, dug in, pitched me off. I was probably going less than 20mph. Landed on my feet, sideways, and bent my left knee to the outside at the joint. The fall crushed the outer-top portion of my tibia (tibial plateau). Had to wait a week for surgery. They used some sort of artificial bone compound to rebuild the crushed bone. They had to hack off part of my tibia to get inside the bone to push everything back up. They buttoned it all up with a plate and some screws. This happened October 2nd, 2011. I am still off the bike per doctor's orders and hope to be cleared to ride again in October. Every step I take is an uncomfortable reminder of that ridiculous slow speed crash. Bret

Pulling out of my pit and getting T-boned by a kid on a 60 hauling ass through the pits. Never saw him coming. Didn't really get hurt, and he was okay.

Pre-running for the Baja 1000. I fell over in a massive rock garden going about 5 MPH and broke both wrists. I had to ride backwards on the course and up the highway about 30 miles before getting to my chase truck with two broken wrists. It was not fun.

It was my 2nd or 3rd lap at River Valley MX in Boyd TX, still cruising and warming up. Purposefully shorted a 60ft table (scoring shack and before the direction change) about 80-90% across and was already preparing for the 180 degree right hander after. Back end of the bike came around and over the top for some reason I'm still unsure of today and pile drove me into the bottom of the landing hill with physics defying force. Knocked me silly and snapped my left collar bone. Still confuses me.

Broken arm tipping over a few weeks after getting my first bike. Also tore my ac joint from just tipping over around a corner and landing on my shoulder. That one hurt.

New Zealand 2001 on an Adventure Ride led by the Dirt Bike Rider of the century. Was last rider down a greasy off camber powerline trail and only 5 miles from the end of day one. Came up to a water bar in first gear, yes first gear. Gassed the bike a bit to lift the front wheel over the water bar and then bike slid to the right as it tracked over the water bar, I slid of the greasy seat to the left. As my body weight was falling my right hip was 90 degrees over the seat, the suspension rebounded and the combination of my body weight falling and the rebound broke my femur at the hip Rather it exploded!! funny thing I knew the rebound was to quick and was planning on adjusting at the end of the day.......

My right leg is now 1.5 inches shorter for that moment in time. I had over 40 years experience at that time in my life and thousands of mile racing everything you can imagine and trail riding. Oh well such is life. I have a small fortune in shoe lifts also and I have a great friend in my Chiropracter...hhahahhahah

I was just practicing riding ruts and turns on my track when I knifed the front end in a deep rut. The bike wanted to lay over but my momentum was still pushing me forward. Hyper extended knee with a end result of a town ACL, MCL, hair line crack on my knee cap and a broken tibia..

going about 5mph on entrance of a tight corner, front end washed before i had time to get my leg out for the corner. when the bike slid across the ground with my leg under it it rotated my leg 180 degrees. Not fun to look down at you leg and see your boot facing backward! ....result torn ACL,MCL,PCL etc..

My injury is a lot like Bret’s and too place in 1997. I was on my second lap of practice on a freshly groomed track and I was clutching (2nd gear I think) it trying to make a rut in a flat sweeper. The back end started to spin out. I must have chopped the throttle, because the back end then did a big swap the other way, basically high siding me and driving my right leg into the ground. Oh it was a 97 CR 250. I then sold it to a buddy of mine who went out and broke both legs on it in a race!! Put me out of riding for a year and it still hurts me today. I have a very limited range of motion

I was racing a gp at Glen Helen. Coming through the back of the main parking lot from the rem track. There was a quick right left around a gate... I made the right and got bumped off the back, which made me pull the throttle wide open. I was riding a yz250 with a decked head so it was instant power in first gear. I bounced back and rolled wrist and pinched off the front brake before I ran into the fence. I flipped over the bars and landed on the fence on my stomach, then the bike flipped over and the rear wheel broke my chest protector and ripped up my back.

It was only a flesh wound

I have two, one is so low speed its ridiculous, the other is just sad/pathetic.

first one. summer of 04. Started racing again in the spring, was quickly getting my speed back. tuesday night practice at 59th and Douglas. All our riding group pretty much quit in 02, racing, and in 04 started back up. There was a pretty good sized triple in the middle of the track right after a steep table top. A friend that was making his triumphant debut/return asked me to tow him over it in practice. So, I roll out on the track in 1st, and im looking back waiting for him. Im over on the side of the track, and as I roll off a step down in first gear standing up going about 5mph on the very edge of the track... i hit a soft spot in the dirt... and it hits literally as my front tire goes over the lip of the down side! I literally got thrown into the bars, endoed and had enough time when i hit the ground in slow motion to literally say "i hope this bike doesnt crush me" oooooooommmph *snap* collar bone. And to add insult to injury, by the time they got the bike off me, and I stand up pissed as hell, the first little wave of woozy you get from a bone break hits right as Robbie goes by at mach 5 yelling "you ok?" ..... FU DUDE!! lolz

actually the worst was back in the pits, after 25 feet on the track, they load my bike for me and a friends wife has to button my damn button fly jeans, right in the middle of the pits. sigh.

the sad pathetic one... jan 2010. dad died in 09 and I decided to make one last hurrah run at AX. 38 years old, lets go run AX. me and robert reynard get a bike all setup, i drop 50 pounds, best i looked in years actually. I go to des moine and take it extremely easy in the over 25 and over 30 or 35 classes since I drove up by myself. So its on, goal, make vegas final. january 1st, we go to an AX track up by tulsa to get some seat time before San Antonio. Oh, and my wife flew out to michigan for 4 days that late morning. So me and a friend head up, its literally 19 degrees outside at 5pm and the temp is falling. We are running late and miss expert practice but no worries nov/int is up next and i havent even walked the track. Get dress, bike warmed up, roll out,take a nice easy first lap looking things over. Finish line is a very standard ax double. lap two, i pull the trigger down the start straight, hit the 180, double triple the rythum section, grab 2nd and fly across the straight in the back, hit the brakes, 90 degree left, grab 3rd, pin it and skim the whoops, and they were no shit big! Hit the 180 left before the finish line, drop it back down into 1st, pivot, pin it.................... you know how expo centers and rodeo arenas dirt is a mixture of good top soil, hay and straw and dried hopefully poop? When I wicked it, I plowed a trench 4 inches wide from the top of the berm all the way down. Well no worries, Ill stay seated and it will hook up on the face of the finish line and I'll be golden. yeah.... I plowed a trench right up the jump face and the second I left the lip I knew I wasnt going to make it clean BUT, I grabbed second, locked the throttle to the stops not once, not twice, but three times and got the front wheel over.... BIG mistake! Flying W all the way down the back side and then yardsale. Some how, and to this day I honestly have no clue, but somehow I broke a bone in my thumb... yes A bone, the one right behind the one your nail is on, into 5 pieces! Not a mark on me anywhere, not a mark on anything showing impact. The insult, I pick up the bike see my glove is crooked, grab my thumb, ummm thats not supposed to move. I get going to the pits, exit the arena, and hit a patch of ice, go down like a ton of bricks. So, drive 2 hours, take a lap and 9/10ths, eat it on the easiest part of the track, ruin my thumb... and to put the icing on, i made sure NOONE told my wife. She was in Michigan taking her grandmothers remains back up there with her mom! What is she going to do from Mich except worry to death!!!! Noone said a word, I had 2 pins put in the weds morning after, which was the day she got back home. So she arrives, took 3 hours to make a 40 min drive because of an ice storm, she exhausted from traveling since daylight, the road conditions and the circumstances in the first place...... and i greet her in the drive way with a hand/arm wrapped up post-op style, still high as fuck from the meds.... yeah. we laugh now but.. lol

Ouch these injuries are no joke in here! Mine would be X-Games 2012 Step-up! Haha

Bike stalled in air, jumped off the front and landed on feet. Broken left femur and right ankle (Talus, Fibia).

I was wheelying over a trench and making it over by hitting the rear wheel on the far side. I had been doing this all day long, but ran out of gas and the bike sputtered just as I was lofting the front wheel. The bike died and went front-wheel-first down into the ditch. It was deep enough that the bike fell in and rotated out from underneath me, pivoting on the frame or swingarm or something.... I went right into the far side of the ditch and hit it square on the thighs. My bike pile-drove me in the back just for good measure.

Man, that one hurt so bad! I was uninjured, but I seriously thought for a few minutes that I had broken both femurs.

60 foot step up at octillio wells. Didnt even do a single run to check anything and went for it....There was a G out right at the bottom that I didnt expect and it unloaded my suspension right on the lip....went 30 feet up and only 45 feet long...I tried stretching it out by putting just my toes on the pegs and lifting up the front end, but it was in pure vein...

All in all I ended up with two broken tib/fibs, two broken ankles, and two broken feet. Shitty part was we were 5 miles from the truck and had to ride back, in which I proceeded to compound fracture my right leg( it was just broken before) and tore my ACL, PCL, MCL, miniscious, growth plate and knee cap...

I would say it was the stupidest crash of my life, but the shit of it is I didnt even crash, just rode away and fell over...

Moscrop

Few years ago I was out in the desert just cruising around this little area in first gear... barely got on the gas through a flat hard pack right turn... slid out and stupidly stuck my arm out as I fell and dislocated my already bad shoulder. Most pain I ever felt in my life. $70k later and my shoulder was fixed (insurance paid for most of that obviously).

Doing a slow couple of laps around a track I had never really ridden on before, the next minute I was laying on the ground the other side of a berm. Tried standing but fell straight back down, had a look at my legs only to see one of them bent at 90 degrees. Have no idea how I fell off I don't remember a thing.

Ended up with a broken femur that took 4 surgeries and a couple of years to get fixed...

I could have this wrong, but I believe Ben Townley broke his arm in a crash he had riding to the start line for a race during his rookie GP season in 2001.

Didn't Jimmy Button's neck injury happen while he was rolling through the whoops on the first lap of practice at a SX?

When I was 11, I didn't make it up this steep hill climb we had next to my mx track. My dad spun my bike around for me and I hopped back on to ride it down. I panicked and grabbed a hand full of front brake. As I went over the front, my leg got caught between the tank/shroud and the handlebars. I broke my tib and fib just below the knee and was on crutches for 6 months. The worst thing was not being able to ride the brand new RM80 I had got for Christmas a week earlier. I had only been riding for one year at the time. I reckon it took me maybe 2 or 3 years to completely get my confidence back, which slowed my progress as a rider a lot. I have been pretty lucky injury wise since then though.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=or8xXQ9CLRs&feature=plcp
theres mine, skip to the last part of the video if you don't want to watch the whole race, come up short on the jump and broke both my ankles on impact over a pretty small jump

Welcome to Vital, Myles

I was racing hard with a guy for a moto win and I was right behind him going past the white flag on the last lap... there was a slow right hand turn (2nd gear) immediately following the finish line with a little drop away to a straight with a good size table top and the normal line was to go wide in the right hander and bank off a small wall of dirt on the out side... I am right on the guys fender and decide to try and go way inside and try to get him on the table... except I never got there because I came in standing and stuck my foot down way to my right in order to try and pivot quickly and sunk my boot about a foot deep into some wet soil with the composition of thick oatmeal... me and the bike kept going but my foot did not and hyperextended my knee outward to the tune of a blown acl/ torn mcl and torn cartlidge.

Not me, but my buddy was cutting across the track to look at a new jump that was just built. Goign maybe 5 MPH, he hit a hay bail just wrong and endo'd . Ended up breaking his back. He basically lawn darted straight to his head. Of course... He was wearing a neck brace...

Mylo! How you liking the 450 on ramps>?

Broke my Ulna, radius bone and tore a ligament on right arm concussion (out for about 5 min.) and badly sprained left arm. I missed a gear over a little 25 mph double I've done a 1000 times. Two surgeries and about 50k later in lost wages. The worst thing is 10 yrs. later my arm is still a little weaker even though I work out all the time. I still ride and won't give it up any time soon. Hopefully done with the major injuries. lol

Hey bw84, we ride there alot. Ive seen alot of people crash on that same jump. Infact my son crashed there awhile back and was knocked out cold!! Luckily no broke bones..

Mine was back in 1989 at Swan mx in tyler texas. I had just got a kx500 and it was my 1st moto on it. We took off the gate went thru the 1st turn and in the 2nd turn which was a slow speed turn my bike swap and snapped my lower leg. Probably wasn't even going 10 mph!!! I couldn't believe it, 2 turns and a broken leg!!!!!!!!!!

Feb 05 I high sided doing 35-40 on a warm-up lap. left me a quadriplegic at C 5/6.

Laugh about it all the time. Funny story i'll include. I work as Race director/Referee now for same series I raced in. We raced at Homestead Raceway (which is the track I got hurt at) on my 5 yr anniversary. Rolled out of the hotel in my new wheelchair, down the ramp into the parking alot and hit a lip where the ramp ended. wound up on the ground laughing my ass off. found it kinda ironic

Thanks MCfan4Life!

And Jharper, the 450 is awesome! Love it, except when it stalls! haha

stalls flipping or on double grabs? I just picked up a kx450 and I wanna ride ramps on it eventually but i was worried about engine braking ect. yours is injected right? last one i rode on ramps just had the idle turned way up.

Yep I've definitely had some close calls at River Valley myself. Their jumps seem to develop kickers that can bite you if you don't know how to handle them. I've had a couple of faces out there spit me out sideways.

Unfortunately I haven't had any slow speed wrecks. They all seem to be higher speed. . .

Damn! Stay out of that town from now on!!!
Glad you can laugh about it.