I'm chugging slowly up my last hill for the day and I find myself on the tail of another cyclist.

As I look at their bike I can tell that there is something wrong with it, but my tired brain can't quite compute it for a couple of minutes. The synapses are telling me "something is out of place" but it isn't obvious.

Then BAM, I see it. How is this girl still riding? OMG, WTF, etc.

The rear derailleur cable is INSIDE the seatstay. The housing is running just over the teeth of the cassette. I'm thinking to myself "how do you even do that?" Not while changing the wheel - you have to either install the housing/cable that way or remove the derailleur.

I catch this girl and say there is a problem with her bike. Luckily we are at the top of the hill and her faster friends are waiting in a bus stop. When I point it out and explain it everyone is a bit stunned. We take a closer look and the housing has been eaten away by the chain and a few strands of the cable are cut and loose.

It seems that she had traveled to a race and her bike box is a bit small, so she removed the rear derailleur. When putting it back together she hadn't noticed the cable running the wrong side of the frame. She had ridden for a couple of hours today and had commented that the shifting was a bit off.

She took out her multi tool, whipped off the derailleur, flipped the cable over and was ready to go again in moments. Now she has to get a new cable on Monday.

"The guys at the bike shop know me VERY well", she says with a cute smile!

I certainly LOLed!