ahsposo 

Oh, of course, had it been me on a recovery ride I woulds have to get that draft.

Not sit and fuss about A Great Draft you missed cuz yer on a recumbent and clueless.

ahsposo 

Yeah! ThaT'S WHAT i TRIED TO SAY.

Kittens.

Terex

The truck was waaay over earlier. He was probably snoozing, on the phone, or something. Looked totally random. Come on you guys - watch the footage. I had a guy hauling a trailer just about clip me the same way. He got over early, then moved back over too soon. Probably didn't mentally calculate how fast the bike was going. Same thing for the bent. Leading cause of right hooks from moms driving mini vans.

And FWIW, bents are virtually invisible.

IthaDan 

Holy crap.

Why does that guy take video of himself from that angle w̶h̶i̶l̶e̶ ̶r̶i̶d̶i̶n̶g̶ ̶a̶ ̶r̶e̶c̶u̶m̶b̶e̶n̶t̶ anyway?

UCF Eric

Being from Lakeland I'm pretty familiar with the road having driven on it a few times. I can say that people pay no attention to the speed limit laws out there.

ahsposo 

And Mr Penishead doesn't even have a flag.

I say Boo Hoo.

znomit

And replace the camera with a mirror.
It will help you to adjust your posture to minimize the double chin, and might tell you when a truck is wanting to use a wee bit of the road.

ahsposo 

Kittens...

Jeepnut22 

Best quote EVAR!!

Zei

That's what got me the most too.
Also, I wonder if the driver heard anything yelled at him...

jwible

And the sun is low based on the shadows. The driver if coming from a phosphate mine probably has a pretty crappy windshield. He probably didn't pick up the rider until the last second. Low profile with the sun behind him = very low vis.

Plus the rider is pretty damn far from the edge of the road for my taste.

Jed19

On a lighter note, the guy looked like he crapped (or was gonna crap) his bibs

mtbikerinpa

That camera paid for itself

Digitalfiend

When you're in command of a 25 ton vehicle that could flatten a row of cars, never mind a cyclist, the onus should be on the driver to be more alert and attentive. There was clearly no oncoming traffic and passing that closely doesn't leave much consideration for movement of the rear trailer due to wind, alignment, road surface dips, or shifting loads nor does it leave any room for error on the cyclist's part due to wind or road hazards. I don't know what it's like riding a recumbent but when I get buzzed by a semi at 90km/h (in a 70km/h) while fighting a crosswind, when that truck comes by and blocks it, I tend to get sucked towards the truck (because of leaning into the wind.) Probably not as bad for a recumbent, but still... It's pretty clear by the video that the driver saw the rider and started to give quite a bit of room but then moved back over.

We also don't know if the rider has a tail light or not (which he should.) It's sad to see some people care so little for human life. This guy could have a wife and kids that depend on him. We all take risks when riding but some drivers could do a much better job at helping to mitigate risk with only a small measure of inconvenience to themselves.

Brutal.

DropDeadFred

this

Nachoman

Scary. But funny. But mostly scary.

tybee128

Wow !

dstrong 

That type of road scares me. Straight as an arrow, 2 inches of pavement (if that) to the right of the white line and probably a 60mph speed limit. So easy for drivers to NOT pay attention. I ride a lot of Texas highways around here and almost all of them have respectable shoulders for me to ride in. I try to avoid the ones that don't.

NWS Alpine

Yeah that was nuts. The driver saw him way back and moved almost to the oncoming lane then came back midway to buzz him. Most likely some white trash redneck driver doing stupid **** for fun and almost killing someone.

on the path

Based on what I saw in the video, there was zero inconvenience involved for the truck driver to have made the situation significantly safer.

saratoga

I'm in Lithia and ride on 39, 640 and 672 sometimes. Most of the time they give plenty of room, but there is a lot of truck traffic on those narrow roads out near the mines and the speed limits are high also. I couldn't imagine trying to ride a 'bent that's 3+' wide on those roads.

The truck driver may (or may not be) be a d-bag but in the end, it doesn't really matter who was right when you get flattened by an 80k# semi.

10 Wheels

^^ Agree. Truck gave rider 1/2 half of the lane. No problem for me when I ride.

alpha_bravo

It's scary no doubt, but when you're riding on a two lane highway with no shoulder there are going to be close calls eventually. Luckily nothing happened to either cyclist or driver.

Louutah

Riding on a road (basically a 2 lane highway) with no shoulder, and what appears to be a fairly high speed limit.....I would choose another route.
If there was oncoming traffic, and the truck was unable to pull out into the other lane to give 3 feet....do you think he would have slammed on the brakes or crushed the bike?

PhotoJoe 

Another way to ask that question is "would he have inconvenienced himself for a few seconds or killed someone?" I'm hoping he would have slammed on the brakes.