The above post is what happens when someone never grows out of being the fastest kid in second-grade,
Enough with the dick waggling; I know I am not going to cycle at a competitive racing level, literally no one in here has claimed to be the next Lance Armstrong and no one aside from you is trying. Your "x% faster" is trumped by my "100% not-giving-a-shit." No one is arguing that cycling is athletic and takes skill or training - this thread is about the cyclists who ride around with a superiority complex and enjoy lording it over others -- just like what you are doing right now. I could not give less of a shit if you decide to ride on the road or not, I don't care how you get your jollies off - do it by sticking your own dick in your ear for all I care. Where things become a problem is when anyone starts being a disruption to others.
I've lost count of how many times cyclists have run a stop sign or light in front of my 5,400# off road vehicle with a Deer Juicer 9000 armored front end, causing me to panic-brake to avoid turning them into finely ground meat-waffles -- and then cussed me out for protecting them from their own stupidity. My city spent tens of millions of dollars creating an entirely separate infrastructure for cyclists to enjoy the mountain foothills. We're talking a scale-model highway system, complete with it's own bridges, roadways, and access points. Of course some dick-in-ear cyclists refuse to use it, or the 14-foot wide shoulder on the state highway and insist on riding three-abreast in the highway lanes. Then they bitch and moan about someone passing them within a furlong.
We paid additional hundreds of millions to completely revamp major sections of downtown and feeder streets to promote cycle safety. Cycle lanes are now between parked cars and the curb, so it's not possible to pass them closely, even if you wanted to. We reduced travel lanes, cut 60% of parking, and increased parking rates to make this happen. You know where I still see cyclists riding? In the now single traffic lane rather than on their very expensive and dedicated infrastructure.
I don't care how fast you are on a cycle, or if the only way you get hard is by riding in traffic. If you want to play in traffic when there is dedicated cycle infrastructure available you will be treated as if you don't belong there. If you ignore traffic signals and signs, you are taking your life in your own hands - to paraphrase Douglas Adams, "Do you know how much damage my car will suffer if it were to roll right over you? .... None at all." I'm not "out to get" cyclists, but a whole lot of cyclists seem dead set on throwing themselves in front of tons of moving steel; I don't know of they were cross-bred with lemmings at some point, have no sense of fear, or are just too stupid to recognize danger.
Thank you for your post - it perfectly illustrates the dick-in-ear holier-than-thou cyclist attitude that brings pedestrians and drivers together in the universally shared opinions that cyclists are pedaling sentient bags of extra-glutenous dicks.