Everybody, please help!

[Seth Kendall]

Thanks to the folks at JensonUSA I was made aware of this fan page (http://www.facebook.com/pages/Theres-a-perfectly-good-path-right-next-to-the-road-you-stupid-cyclist/190080667052?ref=mf) on Facebook. Please help us to get it removed. If you are on Facebook please scroll down to the bottom left of the fan page and click on "Report this Page." If you are not on Facebook it would be worth it to join just to get this kind of mess removed. It's beyond laughing at someone else's expense. People are commenting on how much they would like to kill cyclist. This is just plain disturbing. Thanks.

[Life_in_4Lo]

thanks for the headsup! reported!

[1leg]

reported it.....

[adrenaline503]

reported. thanks.

[Victorian]

Sick! Reported.

[Flounder]

This stuff comes and goes pretty frequently. As a long time rider, I try not to let it get me too worked up. Over the span of 25 years of racing I've seen countless news editorials, forum blatherings, and even road side protests to drum up anti-bike support. I was even sponsored by Clear Channel several years ago when one of their radio DJs went on a 20 minute rant about running over riders. Even TV news channels have run bits on the "nuisance of cyclists." It comes. It goes. I keep riding.

[Pokey]

who goes on the road anyway.........

[flyingwil]

reported

[adventureduo]

Been riding for a long time, both mtb and street. JensonUSA is down the street from my house. This sucks. Reported.

[VermontOverland]

1985 Junior Worlds TTT team member, 7th, Stuttgart, Germany
1986 US National Mens Team Member
1989 US Collegiate National Champion
1990 2nd place, Saco, ME criterium (mentioned only because an 18 year old Lance Armstrong was 3rd)
1991 Pro racer, IME / Bolla Wines Pro Cycling Team
2008 Vermont Master's 35 Cyclo-cross champion
2010 New England Bicycle Racing Association chairman, Junior Cycling Development

In the spring of 1990, while on a training ride with my Cornell Cycling teammate, riding way to the right on a very wide shoulder, my teammate was plowed from the rear by a nearly blind elderly man and catapulted 40 feet in the air, landing in a heap of mangled body parts and bike shrapnel. During his trial, the driver defended himself by arguing that cyclists should not be allowed to use major roadways.

In Europe, a whole racing team can ride all day, two by two, on the narrowest roads and cars will patiently wait behind for a safe area to pass. Why? Because most people there actually ride bikes and understand.

It's been 20 years since my teammate was killed and little has changed with motorists in the US. In a recent informal poll I conducted with local bike club parents, motorist danger was the number one issue with parents allowing their kids to start road racing. Yes, mt biking, bmx and cross are all great racing formats, but it's just wrong that we cannot, as a nation, embrace road cycling as a legitimate means of recreation and transportation.

[Flounder]

Vermont,

I can relate to you on a number of levels. I lived and raced out of the OTC in Colorado Springs from '88 through '90 with a certain Texan down the hall in the dorms. You however posted a sweet racing resume. I raced FFC Series Nationalle in France for Citroen-Citer Le Cruseot Pedal Sportif from '93 to '97. Now I'm a slow poke. :)

I also have a string of friends that were killed on the road or put in wheelchairs. In '93 I started training daily with John Stenner. He was getting back on form for another Olympic slot and I was getting ready for my first season in Belgium. He was killed in May of '94 by a drunk driver.

In 2007 another racer acquaintance that I chatted with at every event and spent more than a few miles at group rides sitting on his wheel was killed on a ride in Flagstaff. He had just got his masters degree and his wife was carrying their first child.

The most defining moment came in 2004 when my training partner Steve Walters was hit and killed in our home town of Prescott. He and I spent all of 2003 and 2004 riding together 4 days a week, often logging 300 mile weeks in the process. As you know, you form a strong bond with a guy you meet every other day at 5am for long brutal road sessions. He was a multiple state champion with a 30 year resume of results. I still race on his favorite wheels. He was known for riding in any weather and the day he was killed I called (rarely did) to chicken out. He picked up the phone and before I could say a word he shouted, "You ridin' or you hidin'?" I would have been killed too had I gone "ridin'." That still weighs heavy.

These stories carry weight because at some point after each of these tragedies, someone said out loud or had the audacity to put into print the words, "he shouldn't have been on the road."

So, people may post Facebook ramblings about cyclist on the road and countless morons will yell out their window as they pass. Frankly, I'll still be out there riding...sometimes on Steve's favorite wheels.:bike_rider:

[VermontOverland]

Jeez, man, we just missed each other. I was at the OTC from '85 to '87 on and off. Even finished high school at William J. Palmer in the Springs riding my bike to school each day down E. Boulder (dodging the cars the whole way). And I knew Stenner. He was huge in collegiate cycling. Do you ever run into my college roommate, Matt Joy, in AZ riding circles?

[Connie]

Reported and posted to my status update.

[kai38]

I live in an area where cyclists ride everyday, single riders & teams on Sat & Sun mornings. Drivers in this area expect the riders and swing wide when passing. All the drivers follow the law driving, making left & right turns from the lane they are in,slowing down & not passing in school zones and stopping at stop signs & lights while the bike riders just blow through them, then blame the car for hitting them. Sorry guys I don't condone injuring anyone but who's responsible for your own safety?

[preacherman]

reported

[Flounder]

Jeez, man, we just missed each other. I was at the OTC from '85 to '87 on and off. Even finished high school at William J. Palmer in the Springs riding my bike to school each day down E. Boulder (dodging the cars the whole way). And I knew Stenner. He was huge in collegiate cycling. Do you ever run into my college roommate, Matt Joy, in AZ riding circles?Crazy. I had a great time at the Olympic Training Center. Those were some cold rides in those winter months, though.

I don't know if you remember when Stenner was the Zipp/Softride bicycle rep for Colorado. He encouraged me to use one of his Zipp "boom" bikes for the Denver Zoo crit. Yikes. It was like bike racing meets bull riding. I nearly crashed that silly thing twice. He was ticked. Neat guy, though.

The name Matt Joy rings a bell, but I've been out of the road racing scene for the past two seasons as I play in the dirt and have fun with this adventure bicycling biz.

[zukrider]

reported!

[VermontOverland]

And while we're talking about bike people-related tragedies, Flounder, do you remember Chris Bailey from the Coors Light pro team? Awful:
http://www.timesargus.com/article/20091227/NEWS/912269983/1002/NEWS01 (http://www.timesargus.com/article/20091227/NEWS/912269983/1002/NEWS01)

[Flounder]

And while we're talking about bike people-related tragedies, Flounder, do you remember Chris Bailey from the Coors Light pro team? Awful:
http://www.timesargus.com/article/20091227/NEWS/912269983/1002/NEWS01 (http://www.timesargus.com/article/20091227/NEWS/912269983/1002/NEWS01)I do remember Chris Bailey from that era. That's a terrible tragedy. The cycling world is always, and I mean always knee deep in tragedies. I used to spend my time off the bike ice climbing and alpineering and there are so few tragic stories in those circles compared to my little corner of the bicycle world.

It just occurred to me I forgot another riding acquaintance of mine was killed two years ago in Utah. Bill Corlis was a fellow masters racer and bike industry guru. I got to know him through mutual riding friends. He clipped a wheel in a pace line and fell into traffic.


Geesh, they keep coming back to me.....In 2004 I was at the Tucson Bicycle Classic when Garret Lemire of California did the same thing in the Cat 3 road race and crashed in front of an oncoming car.

I think it's good this stuff comes to the surface now and again as it serves to remind us that bikes can be dangerous. In relation to the original post, the dangers go far beyond the annoyances of dorks on Facebook who are really just trying to rile up the cycling fanatics. To me, things like that are a benign threat.

[jammyauto]

Some Justice served http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/lanow/2010/01/cyclist-sentenced.html