James Clark never saw the car coming.
When he woke up in a hospital room at Shands at UF on Oct. 31, he couldn't remember the accident that left him and his bicycle lying across both lanes of Southwest Second Avenue near the Levin College of Law.
He couldn't remember the car's driver, who hit him and kept driving, either.
Clark, 37, a UF alumnus, had recently started going on long bicycle rides on Monday mornings to get more exercise, he said.
"It didn't work out too well for me," he said. "I've lost half a day of my life, and I don't remember what happened."
With no witnesses or leads, the odds of finding out who hit him are slim, said Cpl. Angelina Valuri, public information officer of the Gainesville Police Department.
GPD is no longer investigating the case, Valuri said.
"Unless someone comes forward with information, this case will not be solved," she said.
Someone saw Clark lying in the road and got him emergency medical help.
Clark was in the hospital for one day and was unable to work for eight days at his dental sales job, for which he travels the area to work with specialty dentists like oral surgeons.
The accident left him with a concussion, a bone fracture to his face and a broken bone in his hand. A gash on his chin and a cut on his left eyebrow had to be stitched shut.
His sunglasses were crushed tight against his eyes, but they didn't break, protecting his eye from being injured from the impact that left a long scrape down his face running from his eyebrow to his chin.
Weeks later, he still hasn't fully recuperated, but he was finally able to get back into his normal routine at home and work.
Clark remembers seeing a flash of the car, which seemed to be small and white. The white paint on the front tire of his blue Trek road bicycle seems to support that hazy memory.
They don't know the make or model of the car or if Clark was riding on the bicycle path or in the roadway.
Clark has tried to raise awareness about his accident locally in the hope that someone will call with information.
He made fliers with photographs of himself and his bicycle post-accident and distributed them in the area. The flier includes a GPD phone number that people can call if they have any information about the accident.
So far, no one has called with information.
"I'm satisfied that I've done everything that I can do," he said. "I'd like to get well and move on."
