Cyclist seriously injured in roundabout crash misses ride she started
Professional rider ‘making great strides’ after car struck her Nov. 10 at roundabout
Irena Ossola, a professional cyclist who lives in Santa Fe, was having one of her best years on the racing circuit, finding a spot on winners podiums in Europe. Those who know her say the 29-year-old was proud to represent New Mexico on the professional circuit, and that she wanted to give back by bringing a race to Santa Fe.
On Saturday, roughly 80 cyclists set out for the second annual Santa Fondo — a group ride Ossola organized for cycling enthusiasts. It began and ended at the Santa Fe Brewing Co., which offered riders a free drink afterward.
Yet, notably missing from the 50-mile ride was the person who conceived of it. Ossola was instead recovering from a Nov. 10 accident that’s rekindled a debate about whether the city’s streets and surrounding roadways are safe for even the best cyclists.
Santa Fe police say a sport utility vehicle collided with Ossola, who was on her bicycle, at West Alameda Street and Quail View Lane near a roundabout. She was airlifted to the University of New Mexico Hospital in Albuquerque in serious condition while police launched an investigation into the incident.
The driver of the vehicle had told officers the sun was in his eyes at the time and that he did not see Ossola as he swerved in front of her, causing her to ram into his vehicle.
Police have not filed any charges against the man. On Saturday, Mario Salbidrez, deputy chief of the Santa Fe Police Department, said he had no updates on the investigation.
Jackie Shane, a board member for the nonprofit advocacy group the Bicycle Coalition of New Mexico, said many people in the bicycling community know someone who has been killed on New Mexico’s roads while biking.
“Police in New Mexico almost never cite drivers when they hit a cyclist,” she said in an email.
“Irena must have been riding in the shoulder going straight. The driver turned left into her. Claiming that sun is in your eyes means that you should slow to a crawl; not turn left suddenly.
“Drivers who kill cyclists are committing unintentional homicide at best, and for all the harassment we get, sometimes it is even intentional,” she added.
A message posted on Ossola’s Facebook page last week to friends and loved ones said, “your outpouring of support and prayers for her have been extraordinary to say the least.”
“She has been making great strides on her hard recovery after the accident,” the post said. “Every hour we can see slight improvements. And she is doing it very tenaciously. Even though she cannot do it physically she is starting to see a ‘light at the end of the tunnel.’ Dear friends, keep up the excellent job you are all doing and may God lift her up thanks to all your thoughts and prayers.”
Well-wishers have so far contributed more than $5,000 to Ossola’s medical fund, set up to “help offset the incredible medical bills incurred.” That’s more than half the $10,000 goal.
Samantha Rynas, 30, of Santa Fe took over organizing the Santa Fondo ride, which Ossola launched last year as a part of her vision of starting a professional race in Santa Fe.
“I know she had big plans for this ride,” Rynas said.
Rynas, who bikes to work, said there’s “significant room for improvement” in making Santa Fe a safer place for cyclists; just a few weeks ago, she said, she nearly got hit while crossing the intersection of Airport and South Meadows roads with a green light, when a motorist turning right did not yield to her.
Lanes for cyclists on roadways seem to be an afterthought in the planning process, and sometimes such lanes turn into a sidewalks, as on Agua Fría Road, Rynas said. Rynas spoke of instances when vehicles have almost hit her on roundabouts in attempts to pass her. That’s in violation of the rules that cyclists are to be treated as vehicles on the roads.
If Santa Fe is such a forwardthinking city, she said, “it needs to start planning like one” by installing more bike lanes and raising awareness among motorists of how cyclists behave.
As Rynas was speaking on the blustery morning, one vehicle hit another from behind in the parking lot where the cyclists had gathered for Saturday’s ride. Nobody was injured in the fender-bender. Yet the crunch of the crash — a sound the cyclists’ hoped to avoid on the roadways — turned their heads. She said after the ride there were no injuries.
Shane, 52, who also bikes to work in Santa Fe, said she knows the area of Ossola’s crash intimately.
West Alameda is the only route for bicyclists riding west of Siler Road once the Santa Fe River Trail ends. Shane said she has pleaded with the Metropolitan Planning Organization, the district engineer for the New Mexico Department of Transportation and Gov. Susana Martinez to pave a portion of West Alameda with a shoulder for bicyclists.
Though she does not know Ossola personally, Shane said, she could not attend the ride Saturday because “my heart is in my stomach” about the crash.
“But it’s my dream that she’ll be there next year,” Shane said of Ossola.
David Bell, owner of Mello Velo Bicycles on East Marcy Street downtown, said he’s known Ossola for years through his store and recently visited her in the hospital. It was difficult to get back on his bike after seeing a fellow cyclist in her condition, Bell said.
“The more you’re out there, the percentage goes up that something’s going to happen like this,” Bell said.
Carl Gable, 59, a friend of Ossola’s who visited her in Albuquerque on Saturday, said motorists in Santa Fe sometimes dislike anything that slows them down, despite that the law allows for pedestrians, bicyclists, skateboarders and people in wheelchairs to use roads.
“The roads are for people — not for cars,” said Gable, who has raced bicycles on four continents.
Ossola, who attended St. Michael’s High School, has been bicycling for most of her life. Her website says she first learned to ride a bicycle in Italy, where she spent parts of her childhood.
Last year, she told the The Slow Road travel blog that she spent “hours riding up and down the neighborhood streets in Santa Fe. I even remember the first day my mom let me ride my bike to school.”