A mountain biker in Mexico suffered an injury after falling off his bike and it’s definitely not your typical biking injury.

The 40-year-old man fell off his bike while off-road, impaling his neck on a tree branch. The man very wisely chose not to attempt to remove the branch from his neck but instead drove 32 kilometers (20 miles) to the nearest hospital.

Doctors say the man is very lucky to have not suffered greater harm. A CT scan (below) revealed that the branch had only penetrated his neck.

^{The New England Journal of Medicine} 

At only about 1.6 centimeters (0.6 inches) into his neck, there was no serious injury, but it could have damaged the man’s airway, a major blood vessel or a nerve, said Dr. Lev Deriy, an assistant professor and anesthesiologist at the University of New Mexico, where the injured man was treated.

"The neck contains a lot of very important, vital structures," Deriy told Live Science. The man was "lucky not to damage anything."

By not removing the branch, the man avoided further injury or excessive bleeding, Deriy explains.

After surgeons successfully removed the branch and sutured the man’s neck wound, Deriy said that he was released from the hospital and has had no further complications.

[H/T: Live Science]