LONDON — Bend’s Chris Horner was all set for his Olympic cycling debut here Saturday morning. Hamburger and fries for dinner Friday night. Watched a little of the opening ceremony. In bed by 11. Up at 5:45. There was but one thing missing, as he quickly realized after starting the 155-mile road race.

Brakes.

“I was the first guy to attack because I wanted to get the race started,” said Horner, who went on to finish 93rd in a field of 137 riders, 49 seconds behind gold medalist Alexander Vinokourov of Kazakhstan. “Certainly I wanted the race to be as hard as possible because the British team was really strong, and we were riding 10k, 11k, 12k, 13k easy. And it was time to get the racing going.”

He attacked, hit a hard right-hand corner on the tight course that navigated around Buckingham Palace and grabbed the brakes.

“Nothing,” he said. “The bike just wasn’t stopping.”

Horner, a 40-year-old pro, thought quickly and came up with two options. He could slide and fall, picking up what cyclists call “road rash” all over his body. Or, he could ride off the road and into the rows of observers.

“I picked the crowd,” Horner said.

Some estimated the route was lined with up to a million spectators (one was Horner’s wife, Megan, tweeting pictures of Chris). Horner clipped a concrete curb before reaching the onlookers and jettisoned.

“The crowd caught me, and they just kind of toppled me back over,” he said between bites of french fries afterward. “I picked my bike up, threw the chain on, started riding.”

But not for long. Horner’s rear tire was flat. He made a quick change, remounted, and started chasing the main group before thinking better of it. He stopped again to change bikes completely because of the brakes issue. Then came more problems.

“The crank arm of that (second) bike fell off,” he said. “So I had one pedal on and one pedal dangling from my foot. So I changed bikes again.”

Horner also narrowly avoided flying into an open car door at 50 miles per hour. It was that kind of day, but he was not considered a medal contender going in. The highest U.S. finisher was Taylor Phinney, in fourth place. Mark Cavendish, the British favorite to win the host nation’s first gold of these Olympics, was a disappointing 28th.

“For me it was definitely about survival,” said Horner, who showed little sign of his turbulent day on his body other than some grime on his face, accumulated over six hours on the saddle. “I had a lot of bad luck today. So it was definitely about survival and helping my teammates out and just trying to represent good.”

The Olympics are over for Horner, who did not plan to stick around long because he still has races left this season in Europe, Utah, Colorado and Canada. He said he would check out the women’s road race today, then return to Bend and resume training.

Still, he has savored the past week, getting into London on Monday after finishing 13th in the Tour de France. He was the last rider to leave the media interview area Saturday, some 45 minutes after the race ended. He got lost in the Olympic village, found himself next to American swimming great Michael Phelps, and was able to share the Olympic experience with his wife.

His contract with his pro team, RadioShack-Nissan-Trek, runs through 2013, and he joked that if he still had strong legs, he would be up for a second Olympics at age 44.

“Certainly I have results that justify my contract,” said Horner, whose lone lament this year is zero wins (he won the Tour of California in 2011). “I’m strong and still one of the best riders in the world.”