Traffic confrontation escalated, what would you have done?



Powerful Pete said:
LOL. The quality of this thread is improving significantly... :D

Tell us more jhuskey... :D

So you want me to self incriminate in an open forum. Can I think about this for a little while?
 
s2cuts said:
snip...
I honestly wish this never happened, and I have to accept some responsibility for the escalation. But these kinds of people are a menace and dangerous to cyclists. Why should I have to cower from these morons? I refuse to. I would have much rather pulled him from his car, so give me credit for having some restraint. I would like to know how others would handle this type of situation. Maybe someone can give me some good advice for the next time something like this happens.

We all know how you feel. I shout at drivers that do stupid, dangerous things... all it does is annoy them ... but you're right, why shouldn't we express our outrage at nearly being, injured, maimed, crippled or killed. In any other situation a violent reaction would be called self defense.
My best "revenge" on a motorist who cut me off badly was to reach into the car, when he was stopped at the lights, grab the keys out of the ignition (you gotta be quick) and biff them in the bushes on the side of the road... then nonchalantly cycle off just fast enough to stay out of sprinting range.... I must admit I was looking over my shoulder all the way home.
 
::dom:: said:
My best "revenge" on a motorist who cut me off badly was to reach into the car, when he was stopped at the lights, grab the keys out of the ignition (you gotta be quick) and biff them in the bushes on the side of the road... then nonchalantly cycle of just fast enough to stay out of sprinting range.... I must admit I was looking over my shoulder all the way home.
Lol thats quite funny. I wouldn't suggest doing that in a country where guns are legal. Where abouts are you Dom? :cool:
 
coneofsilence said:
Lol thats quite funny. I wouldn't suggest doing that in a country where guns are legal. Where abouts are you Dom? :cool:
Fiji....

....guns ain't legal here but using a vehicle as a weapon seems to be sometimes... although it is getting better as the number of cyclists grow. Have a look here VelocityFiji.
 
::dom:: said:
Fiji....

....guns ain't legal here but using a vehicle as a weapon seems to be sometimes... although it is getting better as the number of cyclists grow. Have a look here VelocityFiji.
Wow thats an amazing bike. 3kg. $15000 for the wheels is amazing too.
 
coneofsilence said:
Wow thats an amazing bike. 3kg. $15000 for the wheels is amazing too.
It would be funny if the owner, German cyclist, Gunter Mai, weighed like 130kgs.
 
coneofsilence said:
Wow thats an amazing bike. 3kg. $15000 for the wheels is amazing too.
Freaky eh? I don't think it would be very enjoyable to ride. Apart from being too light (is there such a thing as a bike that's too light?) I'd be scared that I'd break it. It's too precious.
 
jhuskey said:
Not sure where you are but the laws of my state are fairly specific. A cyclist should ride as far to the right as possible except when turning left or going the speed limit. No other exceptions.
you are probably wrong here because the laws don't state "possible" but "practicable" which still gives leeway to the cyclist...
 
Crankyfeet said:
The guy was definitely in the wrong endangering your life. But why do I get the impression you like to ride down narrow lanes and pull out into the middle... to assert your legal rights as a cyclist?
and where do you get this impression? because he had the audacity to be mad that someone endangered his life?
my point is that if you have the legal right, then thats it you have the right there is no "moral" isssue about using it... so some guy has to wait a few seconds to get around safely... aw boo hoo!

Crankyfeet said:
The issue I have with law-waving cyclists and their assertions of vehicular rights, is that they will spit into a driver's window who doesn't respect that they were within the law... then career down a short hill half a mile later and breeze straight through a stop sign at 20 mph. Now some States in the US regard stop signs as yield signs for cyclists (Idaho for example), but most treat bicycles like any other vehicle, and by law, require them to stop. Now being a cyclist myself, I realize that stopping at stop signs, especially on downhill sections when there are no other vehicles in sight, is a pain, and I have careened through many. But it still isn't technically legal.
so lets see, if he breezes through a stop sign, then he forfeits all his rights as a driver of a vehicle?

does that mean that motorists have that same limitation because, lets face it, they tend to go faster than the speed limits which if Im not mistaken is considered an offense...

lets also ponder this... so he breezes through a stop sign, who is he endangering? the other motorist? I don't think so... but you are going to defend a motorist who actually buzzed a cyclist?
whats wrong with this picture?

now don't get me wrong, his spitting is a road rage incident and with the wrong motorist could get him killed but again this really only affects him... even if he hadn't spit, do you think the motorist would have any different attitude for other cyclists encountered later on? I would bet not...
 
I have a winner.
I was having a nice ride yesterday when I encountered two people ,one on a horse and one older individual leading a mule blocking the road and waving her hands.
I came to stop and she told me I needed to slow down. I told her I had every right to be on the road, and she agreed, but that cars and trucks were no problem but cyclict were. Hmmmmm?
I tried to explain that I could only get about 15 mile an hour coming up the this particular hill which is about 15-18 percent.
She said I wasn't being very nice and it wasn't about numbers. (I thought speed was all about numbers.) Silly me!
I told her to stay on her side and I would do the same, which is not what she wanted to hear.
I fugure I may need to kill her mule and put the head in her bed.
This is the first time I have ever been told I needed to slow down on bike on a open road and then threathen with a mule ,that would kick me.

"Redneck morons, can't live with em, can't drop em off at the animal shelter".
 
jhuskey said:
I have a winner.
I was having a nice ride yesterday when I encountered two people ,one on a horse and one older individual leading a mule blocking the road and waving her hands.
I came to stop and she told me I needed to slow down. I told her I had every right to be on the road, and she agreed, but that cars and trucks were no problem but cyclict were. Hmmmmm?
I tried to explain that I could only get about 15 mile an hour coming up the this particular hill which is about 15-18 percent.
She said I wasn't being very nice and it wasn't about numbers. (I thought speed was all about numbers.) Silly me!
I told her to stay on her side and I would do the same, which is not what she wanted to hear.
I fugure I may need to kill her mule and put the head in her bed.
This is the first time I have ever been told I needed to slow down on bike on a open road and then threathen with a mule ,that would kick me.

"Redneck morons, can't live with em, can't drop em off at the animal shelter".
We have a multi-use trail in the area that passes through what used to be a college town. There is a Horse Riding Center right next to the trail and the riders often ride off to the side of the paved trail. I have seen many occasions where the riders have taken the horses onto the pavement for them to releive themselves rather than to leave the horse apples where they ride:mad: . Rather rude expecting the cyclists to dodge the sh*t on the pavement, and it is as slick as ice if you do hit a newer one:eek: . The good news is that the college has closed, rather permanently or temporarily is still to be determined. The only thing that I will miss is the occasional attractive female horseback rider riding bareback herself:( .
 
kdelong said:
We have a multi-use trail in the area that passes through what used to be a college town. There is a Horse Riding Center right next to the trail and the riders often ride off to the side of the paved trail. I have seen many occasions where the riders have taken the horses onto the pavement for them to releive themselves rather than to leave the horse apples where they ride:mad: . Rather rude expecting the cyclists to dodge the sh*t on the pavement, and it is as slick as ice if you do hit a newer one:eek: . The good news is that the college has closed, rather permanently or temporarily is still to be determined. The only thing that I will miss is the occasional attractive female horseback rider riding bareback herself:( .


I love the Lady Godiva look but in the end I think we both agree it is all a bunch of horses**t.
The same happens here. My bike never leaves any residue.
 
e0richt said:
lets also ponder this... so he breezes through a stop sign, who is he endangering? the other motorist? I don't think so... but you are going to defend a motorist who actually buzzed a cyclist?
whats wrong with this picture?
I wasn't defending the motorist. I was pointing out the hypocritical arguments that some cyclists use. The motorist was 99.9% an ******** by the sounds of the story.

The point you make has some logic. However it assumes that the offending cyclist is hit by the car. What if the car swerves to miss the cyclist and hits a post or a pedestrian or another car. I've nearly had an accident driving a car swerving to miss a squirrel on the road. Also, as much as the cyclist would be heavy odds on to come off worse, there is no fun in running over or hitting a cyclist with a car, unless you are perhaps one of these weirdos with a vendetta behind the wheel like the recent one in Australia who deliberately slammed on the brakes in front of the 60 cyclists in a group ride.

Personally I would rather all States changed to the Idaho law of cyclists being able to legally regard a stop sign as a yield (give way) sign. It makes sense and avoids building up public animosity towards cyclists due to many cyclists not stopping and technically breaking the law.
 
That was fun.
I've just done a very stupidest thing, and had to shout the F word several times, but this thread has cheered me up enormously.
It would seem that a road engineering problem helped initiate the confrontation.
However, the driver and the spitter were destined to meet, offend and disagree.
Ego 1. Sanity 0. Similar encounters are likely.
I posted two important letters, and then remembered that I had not put stamps on the envelopes. Thanks guys. You've made a bad day good.
 
cyclemanx said:
That was fun.
I've just done a very stupidest thing, and had to shout the F word several times, but this thread has cheered me up enormously.
It would seem that a road engineering problem helped initiate the confrontation.
However, the driver and the spitter were destined to meet, offend and disagree.
Ego 1. Sanity 0. Similar encounters are likely.
I posted two important letters, and then remembered that I had not put stamps on the envelopes. Thanks guys. You've made a bad day good.
This is why I use e-mail!
 

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