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Isn't that amazing? Usually lardass couch potatoes.

I work with a guy like that. His attitude toward bikers and exercise is "why exercise when you can drive your truck...and run over bikers when you get the chance."

When I ride my road bike, I ride at a local state park because I know what people think of bikers (they hate them...I wonder why)?

BTW, I've been biking for over 35 years. I stay away from roads with cars.

Certainly there are fools who hate cyclists for no particular reason.

When I was considerably younger I did a lot of road biking. I tried to be a good citizen and stay out of the way of traffic. I was hit once, by a lady who blew through a crosswalk as I was *walking* my bike across the street. She did not stop. I was not hurt, but my bike was a bit bent up.

With all that said, there ARE cyclists who are stupid, oblivious, and hostile. Case in point:

I used to live a block from a winding, hilly, narrow two-lane asphalt road. It was the main thoroughfare from the south side of the community to the north. No shoulders - just a ditch on one side and a narrow sidewalk on the other. The local bike club (out of Atlanta Cycling a couple miles north of the road in question) decided it was a GREAT place for a group ride. Very dumb.

I came over a hill on a curve, doing under the speed limit (35) and there was a whole crowd of cyclists coming up the other side of the hill. They were not obeying the law here which says no more than two abreast - there were 3 or 4 leading the pack, and the outside one was IN MY LANE. I slammed the brakes and hit the ditch to avoid hitting him, and he and the rest of the mob shot me the bird and bobbed off, without stopping to see if I was all right (I was, and my car was fine too.)

I went straight down to Atlanta Cycling and told them that I was filing a complaint with the local P.D. Didn't see any more rides on that road. Good: I don't want some idiot's death on my conscience.

I have some hints.

Sun. Bikers will ride into the sun morning and night. When they are riding into the sun, cars coming from behind them are blinded, sometimes totally. Biker gets hit from behind and everyone blames the driver.

I live in an area served by narrow two lane roads with lots of hills and curves. Of the roads I use every day, one runs east and west and the other north and south....exactly by the compass. Both are favorite bike routes.

Weather permitting, there will be an idiot on one of them riding into the sun early in the morning or late just before sundown.

And even worse, every now and then one will ride through dressed as though he is going to sniper school....gray seat shirt or sweater, even an olive green occasionally.

There should be a law that ALL bikers must wear dayglow orange or the luminescent green and have a real strobe light front and back.

Bikers should always be aware that on narrow roads with overhanging trees, the driver may be in the bright sun and his eyes are adjusted for the glare and the biker ahead of him is in the shadows where he blends with the shadows and the trees. Sure death if the driver is not expecting it.