I was passed by a guy on an ebike while on my 20 mile loop ride yesterday and saw two more riding together going in the opposite direction. Not one of the three were "commuting". When I was a teen back in the late 70's, a kid at school took a small kids bike and would attach a lawn mower engine to the bike with handlebar accelerator. The way it propelled the bike was to jam a portion of a baseball bat onto the drive shaft of the engine which would then be mounted so the bat was up against the rear wheel of the bike. I would see this guy flying all over town on his "bat drive". I even had him make me one. I didn't keep it long. The worst I saw was his back wheel would become all warped from the excessive pressure of the motorized "bat" against it. Stupid.