bobwysiwyg

Pretty much as I suspected. Kick stand seems pretty practical unless you always have a handy tree/pole to lean it against or just lay it down in the weeds.

MotorToad

Mine does! When the 2 pounds make a difference to my paycheck and I have a guy in the pits that catches the bike when I jump off of it I'll take the sidestand off. My dirt bikes have sidestands, too.

Hypno Toad

No girls involved, but I did the same thing when I was in college back in the 80s - Downtown Minneapolis, the city bus in the right lane was making a right turn, so I look back to my left to change lanes to avoid slowing down. HOWEVER, the bus came to a complete stop (I expected him to roll through), and so I rear-ended a city bus. It was more of a glancing blow, caught my shoulder and bars. I hit the ground but no damage to the bike and only my ego was sore.

kbarch

Nope, not idiotic. If it were truly idiotic, then there wouldn't need to be a rule about it, so unknowingly or inadvertently breaking a rule can't be idiotic. Try again, SirHustler.

Wileyrat

Depending how they're mounted, I've seen them damage frames. There's no way I'd put a frame mounted stand on anything other than a steel frame I didn't care about.

sheltonlp

A lot of us wave at each other around here...maybe a PDX thing?

randallr

Ok, one of my stupid deeds when fairly new to riding - Riding my Gran Prix Raleigh in 1970 with my hands on the drops and head down fully, riding away from an intersection. Rode into the read end of a parked car (didn't see it because head down looking at the ground), went over the bars and landed on my back with the bike above me, feet still in toe clips.

oldbobcat

Sat too high and too far forward and wrecked my knees trying to push big gears like a pile driver.

TimothyH

I've been riding since the 70's but this past summer I put my helmet on the spare tire mounted to the back of my old Honda CRV after a ride. The bike was put away in the garage and I didn't think twice about it.

The next day I drove the Honda somewhere and was at a red light. The guy behind me gets out of his truck, picks up my helmet, knocks on my window and says, "You left this on your tire."

bobwysiwyg

I can see that as a possible issue.

kbarch

Yes, and then it would be one like this:

joejack951

The thing is I'd never trust a tiny kickstand to hold my bike upright for an extended period of time anyway. I'll gladly lay my bike down in the grass versus risking it toppling over on its own or because someone bumped it by accident. In my garage I have a stand that securely holds my bikes. I've never once longed for a kickstand but I do appreciate less clutter on my bikes.

joejack951

If you did ride at night those wheel reflectors are all but useless anyway (but it is law in the US that the bike manufacturers need to include them on new bikes). I've set up a lot of bikes for new riders and I always pull off the reflectors and explain that if they are going to ride at night or even at dawn/dusk they need real lights. All those reflectors give some cyclists the false idea that their bike is equipped for night riding when it is still missing the single most important thing one needs (an adequate headlight, with a taillight being an equal second).

joejack951

To post on topic, I bought my first real road bike almost 13 years ago now. I did dumb things like going on my first rides wearing soccer shorts and boxers (then thinking my saddle was the issue). I also got a flat at night in the fall while completely underdressed for the ride and only had not-so-sticky-in-the-cold glueless patches to get me the 15 mile home. I managed somehow though. Mechanically, I ignored loosening spokes on my rear wheel and nearly ruined it but not before taking a few slow but hard rides with it rubbing the brakes the whole time. I climbed my first mountain in a 42/25 low gear because I was too dumb to fix my front shifting to allow me to use my granny gear. And I nearly lost it on the descent when I threw my chain off the big ring at about 40mph due to the same f'ed up front derailleur setting.

Those were the days...

Phil_gretz

As a new rider in 1972, my friends and I did something really idiotic. We drank a bunch of cheap wine and peach brandy in the morning, grabbed our fishing poles, and rode 5-6 miles to a local creek to play hooky.

Horribly sick and listless - we didn't enjoy the day very much. And we got caught later. Worst day ever.

ypsetihw

-bought a target bike for my first adult bike
-spent hundreds of dollars fixing said target bike
-put aero bars on said single speed target bike with flat bars
-sold target bike for amazon schwinn road-wanna be garbage with a bent frame
-rode pretty seriously for over a year on above bikes before I finally spent some good money on a proper bike, never looked back
-wore a child's helmet because I couldn't commit to the whole road bike look at first (hubris)
-refused to wear cycling shorts with padded chamoix because I was too embarrassed (hubris)
-didn't carry flat fixing equipment for months until I was thoroughly stranded at one point, requiring my gf to come pick me up
-almost caused a HUGE pileup on a group ride because I dropped a bottle and swerved out of the paceline to pick it up
-signed up for a citizen's race but rolled out with the Cat 5s out of hubris (riding a schwinn no less), got dropped in 2 miles
-clipless pedal fail right in front of my house, just fell right over
-resisted using Strava for months because I thought it was stupid (more hubris)
-not realizing that anyone can ride "hard" but not everyone can ride "fast"
-thinking 20mph was fast
-thinking riding solo was anything at all like riding with a group
-avoiding riding with a group out of hubris
-thinking I knew anything at all about what I was talking about with no experience and generally being an ass-hat (hubris)

I see a trend here . . . I'm sure there's more, this is just what comes to mind.

Trsnrtr

Did the same except it was an alley crossing. Crushed a vertebrae which still bothers me today.

bargeon

Put a kick stand on my first real bike (ugh, what's the fred emoticon?)

Well, I was 60 years old and it was my first bike in 40 yrs, and it was a hybrid

Stratocaster

Thanks, I appreciate it. I actually have an old bike in the garage that I'm thinking about giving away - it has a flat. I think I'll practice on that one.

headstrongpkm

Salmoning the first ride. Yea I was that idiot..

banerjek

Went with an equally stupid buddy on a 2 day trip in the sticks without tools to fix mechanicals or money. As a result, we wound up hitchhiking in the middle of nowhere so we could get into town and panhandle to get what we needed. It took a surprisingly short time -- a nice lady not only bought what we needed, but insisted on buying us lunch as well.

It was a great trip filled with adventure. On day one, we were forced off the road by darkness and then off a field at gunpoint by a grumpy farmer and then caught the attention of the cops who gave us a police escort to a rest stop where they let us sleep. Naturally we got lost, ran out of water, and wound up fighting a strong headwind on the way back. We just about collapsed when we finally returned. One of my favorite trips.

pressed001

I stick to the head knod over here. Or just completely ignore the other riders. I would like it if people here were more friendly. That would be awesome. But if you wave at someone over here, that you don't personally know, they automatically think you want to have sex with them. No, seriously. These people are all sorts of anti-social. If you ask someone that you don't know how they are doing, they automatically think you want to have sex with them. And I am not kidding. Cultural differences 101.

floridamtb

You win! For me it was shaving all the way up to and including my taint... not really but I'm sure someone has done it

GSJon

I've got a couple for you all.

At 4 or 5 with a brand new shiny bike I cut a corner a little too close and knocked the training wheel of of my bike, fell off and scraped my arm all up on the curb. The training wheels came off after that.

At 9 or 10 I was bunny hopping over a neighbors yard chain. The kind of chains that people who live on corners put across the yard so you won't cut the corner and walk on their grass type. I had already done this many time successfully but for some reason this time the rear wheel caught the chain and I went down hard enough to need stitches from something that hit me in the arm. This was on a Schwinn Stingray.

One of the first times I was riding with clipless pedals I was coming up to a corner to make a left turn on a busy street. I take my foot out of one the clips early and pedal a few more revolutions of the crank. I go to put my foot down and it had clipped back in and I went down pretty hard on my shoulder. I'm glad I didn't get hit by any cars from either direction.

K.Katso

I planned a ride in the mountains. I checked the weather forecast before I left - 15C with light rain. "Great!" I thought. "No problem, I can just wear shorts and a jersey and bring some shoe covers to keep my feet dry!". That was the forecast for where I was. What I failed to do was check the forecast for the place I was going. On top of the first mountain it was about 5C and extremely windy, so with the windchill it was basically freezing. I had no legwarmers, no armwarmers, only a thin rain jacket, and I was soaking wet. I shivered so hard on the descent that I almost crashed a few times from the wobbles. Once I arrived at the next town in the valley below, I aborted the ride, ducked into a small cafe to drink some coffee, and called someone to pick me up.