Tyler Mikasa said if it wasn't for his helmet he wouldn't still be here. Photo / Supplied
Tyler Mikasa said if it wasn't for his helmet he wouldn't still be here. Photo / Supplied
A teenage cyclist says he is "just happy to be alive" after a hit and run just outside of Clive.
The incident occurred along State Highway 51, before the wool scours heading to Clive from Hastings some time Monday morning.
Tyler Mikasa said it was just another Monday morning for him as he was making his way to work where he is doing a building apprenticeship, when everything changed in a matter of moments.
"It was just normal Monday and then the next thing I know in a flash I was hit by the car and was pushed into the creek that runs along the road," Mikasa said.
"When it happened I was pumped up on adrenaline and sort of just pushed on and got on with it, it wasn't till a little while later when I got cleaned up I started to really feel it and went into a little bit of shock."
The 17-year-old's mother Karen Douglas said that although he said he was fine she knew that he would start to feel it after the adrenaline wore off.
"At first he said he was fine and just annoyed about the person hitting him, but he was in a bit of shock and adrenaline so he called my dad who picked him up.
"It wasn't till a little later that the adrenaline wore off and I asked him if he was okay and he just 'no I don't think so'."
He was then taken to Hawke's Bay Hospital where his injuries were assessed with multiple bruises and scratches, along with a fractured tailbone.
The incident occurred along State Highway 51, before the wool scours heading to Clive from Hastings some time on Monday morning. Photo / Google Maps
Mikasa said he was feeling a lot of things about what happened but was just happy to be alive and said if it wasn't for the helmet his girlfriend had bought him a few weeks earlier he wouldn't be here.
"She bought me a helmet because I never used to wear one and I only started wearing it as a bit of a joke so I can point out to her that I was in fact using it," he said.
"But after what's happened I owe my life to it and I can tell you now I'm not going to go on a bike from now on without it."
Douglas said she was just upset the person didn't care to stop and help her son out.
"It was clearly a hit and run because the wing mirror snapped right off the car and the pushed literally pushed him off the road and into the creek that runs along it," she said.
"If they stop and checked how he was that would be fine because accidents happen but the fact they just drove off and basically left him in the ditch is just heartless."
Douglas was travelling down to Christchurch at the time of the incident and said that she only found out after she came off the plane.
"I saw a couple of missed calls so I called back," she said.
