Dreaded cyclists

To put those numbers into perspective, the flat stage 1 of last year's Tour de France was won with an average speed of 26.7mph with other flat stages yielding similar numbers. At 35mph you're looking very good even for the short time-trial stages.
 
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... Well, dang. I don't feel so slow anymore. Thanks Narf. FWIW, I can't sustain those speeds (I averaged 19.9 mph on the flat with the tailwind over 12.5 miles, a middle 5 miles averaged 22.7 mph), and I can't pedal the tribike to its top speed on a flat (it's nice to have a bike that's faster than me, unlike the other two - I still have strength to gain).
 
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Indeed. It's quite a feat. I just sometimes feel like I'm ridiculously slow for the bicycle I'm on (if you know bikes, it's a Cerv?lo P3, the latest generation), and that makes me feel not so ridiculously slow for it.
 
:dunno: my car can do 236, yet hasn't seen an Autobahn since the delivery drive back home... no need to always go flat out for some :driving:, same on a bicycle.
 
Speeding on a bicycle is hard to accomplish. If you speed on a bicycle, the speed limit is very likely "ridiculously low". Except downhill in residential areas, granted. But then again, 35 in a 30 zone is also considered fairly normal for a car, too, so... :dunno:

I think that is part of the problem. Let me explain. The standard speed limits have been set for cars. The only speed limits a bicycle can realisticly break are the 30/40/50 kph, and the last two are not exactly easy to beat too.

So it is perfectly normal for a cyclist to think that any speed limit is way too far for him and never pay attention to it. But this expands; since beating the marked speed limit requires skill and dedication most of the time, most of the cyclists will go on thinking that they can not speed at all, so spped in itself will not be considered important, because always legal, and so they will be riding at whatever speed they want.

Unfortunately, the speed limits are made for cars driving on car lanes, with car tyres, car suspensions, car brakes. Not for bicycles riding on kerbs or bike lanes and for which slowing down, braking and direction changes can be tricky, difficult, or even impossible. Even in case they actually have good brakes and/or skilled riders, which is not granted at all, as we can see everyday.

The fact is that bikes should have their own speed limits, which they haven't. Cars' speed limits are far too high for bicycles to be meaningful in any way. Apart from 30 kph, maybe.

Are you suggesting the limits for bicycles should be lower? And then you would complain about the cyclists holding you up? ;)

They already do, when they are not sport cyclists in lycra running every yield sign or red light imaginable (at least in my neighbourhood). Bicycles slow me down constantly. Yet I understand that they can not really go that much faster.

Bicycles and cars are very different beasts. Too different for sharing the same spaces. I already said it in the last two to three pages of comments in this thread (when speaking of cycling boxes at traffic lights), I think bicycles and cars are not made to be together on the road. Forcing them together will bring dedicated rules to favour bicycles, and this will have idiotic consequences like raising cars' pollution and fuel consuption, raising the chance of dangerous situations, slowing down traffic, raising angryness against bicycles and generally reducing life quality for everyone.

I also said, somewhere, that bicycles should be forced to slow down to pedestrian speed in some situations, like at a crossing with a road, for example, in order to give cars the possibility of actually seeing them and slow down to let them cross the road.

I understand and truly appreciate your light touch of irony and your relaxed disposition in this discussion. But I really am quite different from the stereotypical bicycle hater. ;-)

"you must not go faster than your vehicle and your capabilities allow to do safely" rule anyway.

Speed limits exist exactly because people are ususally unable to tell by themselves what that "safe speed" might be. Cyclists are the same people who drive cars or ride moptorbikes: they'll make the same mistakes.

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Well, we don't actually know that. Without having been there, how can you tell it wasn't safe enough to do 35mph?

The real question is can you tell if it was? I have read Strelok16's words and comments. Those are the only elements we have. If you want, I can turn the thing by saying that in a residential 30 mph area where the speed limit is appropriately set for cars, a bicyles doing 35 (or even 31 mph) would be not just illegal, but also wrong.

Maybe he had phenomenal brakes, superior skills, yada yada - all the arguments people make towards higher car speed limits.

Wouldn't we make fun of a cyclist saying this kind of crap like we do when a driver does?

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It's harder to speed on a bicycle than you seem to think

Sport cyclists around here are very likely to be found riding at around 25 mph when they are pushing. Probably the very light downhill of some of the roads where I usually see that happen is helping them significantly, but it's not unusual at all.

Still, I think that's too fast for them in normal traffic, I don't feel they would be ready or able to stop in a short distance in case of problems, or even to keep the bike on its wheels. I might be wrong, clearly, but I think they will require much much more space than I would, at the same speed.
 
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You would. However, that argument has been made by drivers many times here, and no fun was made on any occasion because they drive cars.

And wouldn't you? You were answering to me, I have answered to you. I want -your- opinion, not what other people have done, some place else, some other time; that is not relevant in any way.

Beides, in this same forum there are people who take safety quite seriously. I remember several situations where dangerous behaviours from drivers who believed they were too good for rules have been condemend harshly. The brazilian Audi+bike race or the double center line crossing on blind spots, for example (just the first two to pop into my mind), so your reference to what other people have said would not work in your favour even if it was relevant to this little exchange between you and me. You have let your opposition spirit take control of your brilliant logical skills and bend them out of their field and make them slave of the will to prove other people wrong. Don't let that happen, you don't need it.
 
And wouldn't you? You were answering to me, I have answered to you. I want -your- opinion, not what other people have done, some place else, some other time; that is not relevant in any way.

Beides, in this same forum there are people who take safety quite seriously. I remember several situations where dangerous behaviours from drivers who believed they were too good for rules have been condemend harshly. The brazilian Audi+bike race or the double center line crossing on blind spots, for example (just the first two to pop into my mind), so your reference to what other people have said would not work in your favour even if it was relevant to this little exchange between you and me. You have let your opposition spirit take control of your brilliant logical skills and bend them out of their field and make them slave of the will to prove other people wrong. Don't let that happen, you don't need it.

Also to add to that, as you have already pointed out cars and cycles are different beasts altogether, while car technology (brakes, driver assists, tires, suspension, etc...) keeps improving bicycles really have nowhere to go in that sense.
 
And wouldn't you? You were answering to me, I have answered to you. I want -your- opinion, not what other people have done, some place else, some other time; that is not relevant in any way.

Beides, in this same forum there are people who take safety quite seriously. I remember several situations where dangerous behaviours from drivers who believed they were too good for rules have been condemend harshly. The brazilian Audi+bike race or the double center line crossing on blind spots, for example (just the first two to pop into my mind), so your reference to what other people have said would not work in your favour even if it was relevant to this little exchange between you and me. You have let your opposition spirit take control of your brilliant logical skills and bend them out of their field and make them slave of the will to prove other people wrong. Don't let that happen, you don't need it.

Here's an example of what I was talking about: http://forums.finalgear.com/general...-traffic-law-thread-56273/page-4/#post2095982 (+ next two posts)
 
Here's an example of what I was talking about: http://forums.finalgear.com/general...lists-46149/page-59/general-...4/#post2095982 (+ next two posts)

Very nice. I had two of them in the previous post, supporting my idea. You're still down by one. But don't rush a research, because there's an important point:

it's still not relevant. And this is not a competition.

(other users, don't proceed on if you are (like you should) not interested)

Let's recap: you started by telling me that speeding cars are socially accepted, so should speeding bicycles (1149). I pointed out that you were generalizing, and that speeding car are tolerated, not accepted, only in very specific situations. Bicycles are on the contrary considered unspeedable (to coin a neologism)(1150). You have proposed exceptions specific to Strelok16's story (incidentally proving my point on how a bicycle is considered unspeedable)(1156). I have replied to all of them(1167), and you only replied afterwards on one of them (the other being acceptable to you, I must assume)(1168). In the only one line you went on, You were telling me that "other people" might have said that etc. etc. etc. (1168). I told you this is not relevant as you were speaking to me, not to someone else (1169). Last, you offered me examples of something that still is not relevant (1171).

Because your spirit of contradiction is running wild and free. But this is not a competition. There's nothing to win or lose.

The interesting part is that one of the original points of my comment on Strelok16's words was the letter of the law alone can be misleading. Safety is not a written text, is physics and common sense, and laws and regulations might or might not be fair depending on the situation. So even if your point was relevant (and it isn't), I started by saying that the specific elements of a story might change greatly the outcome of a judgment on what is acceptable and what is not.

Is everything clear, now? Because I won't go on with that anymore. That was just because I like logical challenges. Ok? ;-)
 
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You must spread some neologisms around...
 
Cycling season has started up again, time for me to list my pet peeves with drivers:
1. Don't lurk 50 yards behind a cyclist for mile after mile if there's no one in the opposite lane. Just pass me, you're making me nervous. I promise I won't suddenly swerve in front of you, honest injun.
2. If you clearly beat me to a four way stop, don't get all flustered, become convinced that I'm wildly out of control and sit there and wait for me. Just go, it's your right of way. Trust me, it's easier for everyone. I'm clipped into pedals and track standing, I can't easily wave you through. Please note me trying to "nod" you through with my head. I promise, I won't suddenly dart in front of you.
3. If you're driving an SUV or pick up, learn exactly how wide your car is. Don't blow by me at 50 MPH with approximately one foot between my left elbow and your passenger side mirror. It's disconcerting. If you're doing it intentionally, you're an asshole who's putting my life at risk.
4. Learn to gauge closing speeds. I'm going a lot faster than a ten year old on a Huffy but I'm not going 45 MPH. Don't sit waiting to make a left turn when you see me coming in the opposite direction and there's clearly plenty of time to make the turn before I get there. Likewise, don't make a right turn right in front of me if I'm in the drops at 27 MPH. Many drivers seem to be completely unable to gauge relative speed...
5. Have five seconds of patience. It's not going to kill you. Just chill out for a second.

Pet peeves for other cyclists:
1. Get the eff out of the way of cars. Stop making a nuisance out of yourself.
2. Get some lights. You need them, trust me. Get both a headlight and a tail light.
3. Learn to ride a straight line. Learn to engender confidence in drivers and other cyclists around you.
4. Be aware of what's going on behind you, don't be completely oblivious to the world. If I shout "on your left", don't panic and swerve to the left. I promise I won't hit you as I pass.
5. Stop at stop signs and red lights. Please. You're giving us a bad name.
6. DO NOT ride your bike with headphones on. This is really dangerous and a bad idea.
 
4. Learn to gauge closing speeds. I'm going a lot faster than a ten year old on a Huffy but I'm not going 45 MPH. Don't sit waiting to make a left turn when you see me coming in the opposite direction and there's clearly plenty of time to make the turn before I get there. Likewise, don't make a right turn right in front of me if I'm in the drops at 27 MPH. Many drivers seem to be completely unable to gauge relative speed...
In defense of drivers... This is actually very, very difficult. Gauging the closing speed of something narrow is something humans are bad at. It's just how we are. That's not to say people shouldn't try to be better - they should. But this will always be an issue.

4. Be aware of what's going on behind you, don't be completely oblivious to the world. If I shout "on your left", don't panic and swerve to the left. I promise I won't hit you as I pass.
In this vein... STAY ON THE RIGHT (or, stay on the side you should be on in your location). On the narrow paths where cars aren't allowed, it's not unusual for an approaching bicyclist to veer to their left, my right. ... WHY?! I'm already occupying that side of the pavement. Are you trying to crash into me?
 
Today, the bus and tram drivers are on strike in my town (and many others). Result: Many people who can't ride a bike properly use it for their commute... :(
 
I like how the cyclist admits to being in the middle of the road for fear of someone opening their door.

I like how the Caddy chose to overtake in a narrower spot right before the road opened up with a lot more width.
 
I like how the Caddy chose to overtake in a narrower spot right before the road opened up with a lot more width.

Cadillac driver was within his rights as he can and did overtake safely. Bicyclist was being 'special' and taking two lanes, screw him. "Oh, I'm afraid of a door" - then change lanes, idiot. It's what we motorcyclists have to do, you shouldn't get a free pass.
 
The cyclist had a perfectly reasonable distance from the parked cars. Probably even less than recommended - which is one car door width or in other words, 1 metre at least - and that's measured from the tip of the handlebar (or the cyclist's elbow), not from the bike's centerline (common mistake).
The SUV driver could have easily overtaken with a safe distance by using the empty parking spots on the other side. He deliberately endangered the cyclist by not doing so.
That said, stopping to argue with asshats like that is useless, the cyclist is an idiot for that.
 
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