Six Years Ago Today: Time To Reflect, Move Forward
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By Alan Snel, LVSportsBiz.com Publisher/Writer
It’s March 7 and here in Las Vegas I mark the date with an introspective look back at what happened six years ago on this date when a distracted motorist smashed his Chevy Cruze sedan into me from behind while I bicycled on a quiet intracoastal road north of Fort Pierce in St. Lucie County on Florida’s East Coast.
How do I deal with this anniversary? I focus of taking a painful memory and using spring’s rebirth to drive me forward.
For example, I opened a window behind my desk to feel the mid-afternoon air today. I have no idea of the exact temperature except I do know it was warm enough to ride the Gary Fisher mountain bike on the Red Rock Loop in shorts today and open that window when I got home.
I was glad to hear the Raiders installed three sets of bike racks in a parking lot on the north side of their stadium. On Raiders game day, the existing bike racks get jammed up with bikes and it was good to see my request to the team to install more bike racks was taken seriously.
The new bike racks still have their plastic covering on them.
The current bike rack was packed on game day.
They’re only bike racks, I understand. But the deeper point is that someone cared enough about bicyclists at the Raiders to order the bike racks and install them.
It shows that bicyclists matter and our safety matters, too.
This new site was created in the aftermath of that near-fatal crash back in March 2017, when the motorist drove his car into me. I was living in Vero Beach at the time and the bike ride down one side of the intracoastal and back home on the oceanfront A1A was a daily ritual. In June 2017, LVSportsBiz.com was launched in Las Vegas three months after the crash.
I survived the violent crash. The St. Lucie County Sheriff’s Office did not even give a ticket to the motorist for slamming his car into me.
That’s the type of justice you see around bicyclists who get injured by negligent motorists.
I wrote a book about surviving and moving forward with LVSportsBiz.com
On Sept. 20 here in Las Vegas a half-year ago, I was struck again by a motorist while bicycling. This time it was a woman who made a right turn on a red light, crashing into me as I bicycled through the intersection at Hacienda and Decatur that morning. I’m OK.
Here in Las Vegas, when March 7 rolls around, it’s typically in the middle of a very busy sports week for LVSportsBiz.com. College basketball conference tournaments are happening in Vegas, and there are usually a NASCAR race, a UFC fight show and Golden Knights games to cover.
So. it’s just too darn busy to get caught up with looking too much in the past.
It’s spring and the temperatures are warming and my favorite desert plant, the beavertail cactus, will be in bloom in a few weeks.
Spring is about rebirth and a time to reboot.
Enjoy the increasing temperatures and this thing called life.
