Is it time to start calling out bad cyclists?

she's my neighbour. Just took over a bottle of @Vince excellent champagne by way of apology.

"Accident"

Uhhh huuh....riiiiiiight....

That's not a bike crash, that's the opening scene of Richard Curtis's next romcom

I can see how it looks.

However, I really wanted to get home with my coffee unspilled.

Very nice of you!

Hopefully I'll get a new customer in the process ;-)

To the guy riding his Di2 Aeroad in RP/PP this morning while wearing a pair of trainers - you are a bellwhiff.

Or possibly, a thief.

Nah.

Much amusement on the way home as Mr Lycra-Pinarello rider would not get off my wheel despite the fact that I was cruising home. I slowed to force him to pass and he got shirty with me. I recognised him as a guy I'd seen slipstreaming a car in Regent's Park a few weeks ago, fail to see that the car was braking and slam into the back of it (he was fine). Another good reason I didn't want him on my wheel. #spideysenses

Just got caught behind an electric bike doing 5mph between the lanes through the Euston underpass. Trail of motorcyclists behind him like he was the Pied Piper of Bikers. Then he starts swerving in the lanes.

Dude would have been faster taking the surface road anyway, lights and all.

Two riders in aero tucks (prob testers rather than triathletes as they were not wearing knee length compression socks) riding along the Westway (a motorway) yesterday.

Brave/foolhardy: you decide.

the Pied Piper of Bikers

Perfect imagery.

Hasn't been a motorway since 2000 (I'm an insufferable pedant).

I've ridden the westway. It's the quickest way into town from white City by a long way.

Just like riding any other dual carriageway, but with a 40mph speed limit instead of 70. Why not?

I've ridden the A3 out towards this indoor climbing place in Tolworth and while it's not technically a motorway, it fucking feels like it. 0/10 would not dice with again.

E&C this evening. Was happily rolling to a stop 3 or 4 bikes back at the red light in the segregated lane southbound from Newington Causeway. I like to take the middle of those lanes when I can - it just feels very cramped next to people I don't know/trust, and I prefer to have space to move away cleanly. Side-by-side just introduces extra hazards I don't like. That mustn't have been clear to the lady who decided to squeeze past anyway - almost brushing my shoulder with hers.

Gist of the conversation:

Me: Um...hi? What's the point in that? The light's red.
Her: You should pick a lane, left or right.
Me: [Pointing out lack of markings] There aren't two lanes here...Why did you pass me with so little room?

She apologised, I suspect more by way of ending the conversation than anything else. Fair play, it wasn't turning out to be a very pleasant conversation.

Lo and behold, as the lights went green, another lady pulled the same move, this time with a hand on my back as she went by.

I'm prepared to discuss the merits and otherwise of not allowing people to pass in those lanes, and I'm open to the suggestion that lane hogging there is a bit selfish, but ffs I'd really rather people didn't just squeeze past anyway. Nobody's gaining any time MGIF-ing at that point- not with the timings of the subsequent reds.

How to you lot deal with those lanes? Fast lane/slow lane or take the middle?

How to you lot deal

Indiscriminate kidney punch

Hey everybody on my commute: this is not a fucking team time trial, get off my goddamn wheel. I don't know/trust you and you're not going to take a turn in this imaginary race. Go away.

I find this happens less if I soil myself while wearing white bibs. Worth a try.

A3 out in that direction is the most cunt filled piece of road. More needless punishment passes than anywhere else in my experience.

Epic fail by any reckoning:

http://www.standard.co.uk/news/london/moment-cyclist-barges-through-level-crossing-and-is-nearly-hit-by-train-a3537091.html

Sounds like you've ridden on that LA style bendy, hilly, underpass-filled urban motorway with 3 lanes squeezed into the space of 2, no hard shoulder and merging traffic every 500m more than once?!

Time for new handlebars.

http://www.charliethebikemonger.com/stooge-moto-bar-11176-p.asp

Oooh, I love them. And I need new bars anyway.

A colleague and I were recently discussing the stealthiest way of getting revenge on close-passing drivers (purely hypothetically, of course). He said he'd been thinking of constructing a plastic reservoir mounted to his frame and connected to a brake lever that would squirt a corrosive liquid at the paintwork of any vehicle that got too friendly. Could adapt that with a safer liquid (water?) for use against MGIFers in the summer.

Diabolical.

Just realised the green LCC sticker that is the kite-mark of "shit bikes, ridden badly" has now changed colour as demonstrated by a wax-moustached twat on a Whyte hybrid this AM.

Reading the comments, I wonder if they're going to demand license plates on pedestrians any time soon... :P