I am in a bit of a spot trying to decide on how to increase my cycling. I really enjoy the miles I have put on my mountain bike and have been contemplating a road bike for a while now. The desire to do centuries and maybe what I see as epic rides ( St Augustine to Key West) has been a constant for a while now. However, I have one main difficulty with this....traffic. I ride my bike mainly at a local MUP which is a 5k loop that I ride 12 to 20 miles daily. It is hilly and is a good workout. In addition I drive a couple hours occasionally to go to other areas that have Bike Paths that are longer 20 to 30 miles and have done 60 miles once (loved it).

I have ridden on the road a number of times but in my area there are zero bike lanes and at time lots of traffic. I am not necessarily afraid of the traffic when I am riding, it just seems like once a week we all read an article or a thread of a biker being killed by an inattentive driver. I am all about being a defensive rider, I rode motorcycles for years. I think at this point I should mention that a drunk hit me on my motorcycle 25 years ago and I lost a finger in that little "accident".

There are a lot of seasoned riders here with many miles under them, so I guess I am just curious how to you stay safe, or try to anyway.