Iowan Hit By Car During World Triathlon Attempt

Sun October 31 2010
Posted Nov 1, 2010
10,017

Des Moines, IA From Oct 11th 2010 The Des Moines man trying to complete the world triathlon ran into some trouble in Kazakhstan Saturday. Charlie Wittmack was hit by a car that was traveling about 50 mph. Wittmack was in the middle of the second leg of the world triathlon. He is attempting to bike from France to Mount Everest. Wittmack told KCCI that the car clipped him and then he remembers waking up in the middle of the roadway. Wittmack's family said he only suffered minor injuries. Wittmack spoke to KCCI on Monday about the crash. "It was a great day of cycling. I was about 2/3 of the way, 3/4 of the way through the day and just feeling great. I ride on the highway on the left side of the highway and I do this because it allows me to see oncoming traffic. And when oncoming traffic comes, I get off on the left side on the shoulder so I'm out of the roadway when there's two cars. The roads here really aren't wide enough for two cars to pass safely. So I was riding down the highway, getting ready to come into town and I heard suddenly a crash into my back bicycle rack on the bike and it was this little white Audi that had run into me." "As best I can tell, it pushed the wheels of the bike out from under me and then we could see there were scratches on my helmet that matched scratches on the left rear passenger door of the car. So I then was hit off the bike and slid down the asphalt highway on my right side. And now the highways here are very worn down and they're polished almost from all the rubber of all the tire tracks." Wittmack plans to rest in the city of Turkestan for a couple of days before continuing his bike ride to Mount Everest. see video at source

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