NRG = mc² said:
I've also heard that in case you feel a crash is inevitable just to relax and take your hands off the wheel at the last moment, to stop you snapping your arms. As if anyone would think of that before smashing into something.
It becomes second nature after a while. I've long drilled into my head the idea of going limp whenever I fall off my bicycle. Although I haven't had a crash in something like seven years, the idea has served me well in the past. One time I hit a pothole doing 37 MPH. The front wheel bent and locked up, and I fell off the bike. I immediately went limp and simply waited until I stopped sliding along. I aided my deceleration a bit by pressing the toe of my sneakers into the ground, but other than that, I was completely relaxed, with my arms stretched forward. Outside of the expected scrapes on my knees and elbows, I was perfectly fine, and got up immediately to retrieve my bicycle, which had stopped about 100 feet before I did.
Since most people don't get into accidents often enough to practice relaxing, the next best thing is to visualize an accident scenario and see yourself going limp. Do this enough times and when an accident does occur you'll actually find that it's second nature. The only caveat is that I only go limp when the bike is already falling beyond any possible recovery. There have been times when I started falling but managed to react quickly enough to recover and prevent the fall, which is obviously a far more desirable outcome.
