Originally Posted by
Rick@OCRR
Wow, two months, that's HUGE. I tore a muscle three Monday's ago and after 3 weeks of driving to work, I can't wait until I can start riding again. it's the muscle that attaches my right leg to my body, but I'm making progress . . . done with the crutches, done with the cane, still on lots of ibuprophen though. But I am walking on my own and want to try riding soon; just not sure how soon.
Anyway, in addition to the things you've noticed (and I agree with) I seem to see lots more salmon (riders riding against the flow of traffic) than I see when I'm riding. I do see salmon, of course, when I'm riding but there are just so many of them! Salmon on the sidewalks, salmon on the street, they're everywhere!
Rick / OCRR
Yup! It's the salmoning that really gets me infuriated!
Originally Posted by
mtalinm
I just took a couple months off of commuting after tearing a calf muscle. (mighty hard to pedal when that happens.) drove to work or took the train most days, leaving me to watch the cyclists instead of pedaling alongside y'all. noticed a couple of things while I was away:
Drivers suck. I was appalled at the number of times motorists cut close or simply blocked cyclists. News to no one, but it seemed much more frequent and egregious when I saw it happen to others.
Happens all the time...
I do believe that sometimes they're all on contract to get me!
Cyclists appear reckless. It seems like most cyclists run red lights and stop signs. As a cyclist myself, I could tell that most of them were slowing down and looking both ways before proceeding, which I confess to doing myself. But as a driver, even as one who loves to commute by bike, I found this infuriating. Mostly I think the problem was "cars aren't running red lights; why are bikes?" though there was also the petty resentment of losing ground on others.
Runnining red lights seems to be the major theme of most bicycle commuters. We want equal access to the roads, but not equal responsibilty for obeying the law. The law is there to protect us all. Not just cyclists, motorists, or pedestrians...
"Losing ground to others", I think that's more of a guy thing....
However, I have observed a few females engage in leap frog, as well, but that's rare. It's mostly us guys!
There should be some kinda doctoral study done on this phenomenon for some poor and unfortunate post-grad student.
It's funny! We do it while driving cars and riding motorcycles, too! 
Cyclists move at highly variable speeds. This may seem obvious, but compared to cars there is a lot of heterogeneity in how fast cyclists ride. Sure, there is the occasional leadfoot or slowpoke, but for the most part drivers keep up with each other. We cyclists are all over the map. Many of us are happy to plod along at 7-8 mph, while others are looking to maintain 13-15. And of course you have the occasional crazee trying to set Strava records downtown. Because there are rarely two bike lanes side by side, this leads to a lot of us darting into traffic to pass. It hadn't really occurred to me until I was watching from the minivan.
This is quite true. However what drives me crazy, is when some idiot cyclist breaks his neck to pass me, only to slow down and practically forbid me to pass him back up!
Lastly, I was a lot happier when I started commuting again!
Glad you're back in the saddle again...