Honking your horn at a cyclist is not just rude, it’s unsafe!

The premise of this discussion is about drivers who honk their horn as they pass cyclist.  I live in a fairly rural area and it never ceases to amaze me how some (a minority for sure) can be so inconsiderate of others. Today a semi came by me and honked from the time he was about a hundred feet back until he had passed me.  The act was simple harassment, there was no other explanation. I was biking down the highway about a foot off the gravel shoulder and a foot right of the white line that designates the shoulder when the incident happened.  I did not get the license plate number, or I would have called the authorities (cell phones are so handy).

Why does this bother me.  I am an experience cyclist who has dealt with poor drivers on nearly a daily basis since I was in grade school, I know how not to react in such a case, but other cyclist do not.  Just before summer after my sophomore year of high school, I was talking to another kid and he asked me about a bike route I had taken before in Door County, Wisconsin a popular tourist spot which drew thousands of vacationers each summer.  I told him it was a beautiful route, but taking the main road was dangerous.  Unfortunately, you had to take the main road at a couple points.  What I heard about his trip has haunted me to this day.

He was biking along the main highway on the right hand side of the road when a motor home who was about to pass him honked. He turned his head to see the vehicle and when he did his shoulders turned, which in turn drew the left arm towards him causing his bike to vier to the left. His death was instant. The driver did not give him enough room, three feet of clearance is the law, and he honked but did not give the kid time to react, and a son, a brother, a friend was stripped away from those who loved him.

The driver was reckless and probably just wanted to get started on his vacation. The man who honked at me today was just trying to do his job and get his load of whatever to wherever it needed to go. I was just going to work to earn a little money to take care of my family.

Driving rural roads

It wasn’t long after I moved here from Milwaukee that I started noticing that I was becoming more patient with slow moving vehicles.  In Milwaukee a slow moving vehicle was some idiot who did not know how to drive in the “big city”. Here they were farmers just doing their job, or an elderly couple I knew from town out for a little ride.  They became real people.  In Milwaukee life was fairly anonymous.  Here, nothing seems anonymous. If someone doesn’t know who you are, they can easily find out.

I doubt the driver this morning was from around here (I am making this assumption but don’t know for sure) because I was anonymous to him, someone he would likely never see again.  Most semis are very courtious and go out of their way to pass me safely as I am sure they do to the farmers driving their tractors and the amish in their buggies.  But then there are those few who just don’t seem to get it.

As Homer Simpson said so elegantly “Why Must I Fail at Everything I Do”?

Yes, it is only Tuesday and I have suffered another goal defeat.  I have not biked to work every day during Wisconsin’s Bike To Work Week.  Rats!

I got up this morning and it was raining.  Boooo.  This is disheartening as I have been hoping to redeem myself from the national bike to work week, when I failed to complete that week as well.  But now, on the second day the rain has washed my chances of biking every day this week away.

Nice day for a ride.  Sunny, not too warm not too hot, just right for biking to work.  The ride was uneventful on the way in and just the same on the way home.

On the way home I decided to push a little, and for the second time this year, I made it all the way home in the big ring.  I know I am getting more powerful on the bike, but that Christmas pie is still hanging around (Sorry for the visual).  I have a 10K run that my brother and I do every year coming up on Saturday so as I have still not shed the winter weight, I am not sure how much I should push biking this week, but what the heck.  The worse thing that can happen is that my brother and his girl friend beet me.  They’re both younger anyway.

Wisconsin’s Bike to Work Week is June 6th to June 12th

My Goal for Bike to Work Week

My goal for this week is to bike every day to work.  I failed on national bike to work week, but this week (Wisconsin’s Bike to Work Week) I can redeem myself.  Tomorrow I will start again and try to bike every day in a week.  I have not done this (bike to work every day for a week) in a couple years.  I am convinced all it will take is a little effort on my part.

I will also be running a bit this week and perhaps swimming.  I have the Bellin Run, a 10-K, coming up this weekend and have to put in a couple more runs to prepare, and I also have to start training for a triathlon I want to do.  If I complete that, I may try for a larger triathlon in the early fall.

OK, you don’t have to be training for an event to bike to work.  If you live within two miles of work or school, bike it.  It doesn’t take that much longer and you can sometimes park a bike much closer than you can park your car, which can actually make the commute shorter.  Also, you don’t need an expensive bike to bike to work.  I use a road bike I bought 20 years ago and one I bought 10 years ago when biking to work.  My fiance uses a hybrid for her commute.  She has a rack on the back of the bike and a pannier (a bag to carry stuff) that connects to the rack to carry things back and forth to work.  I sometimes steal her bike when running to the grocery store as you can fit two gallon jugs of milk or juice plus other things packed with them.  Because the pannier is connected to the rack it is very stable for carrying things.

She is going to try and bike as much as possible this week as well.  No excuses!

My Goal/Challenge for you

Bike to work.  Make a concerted effort to bike when you can this week.  Start a habit that will change your way of thinking about short trips around town, and may help change our society.  I’m serious.  At least make an effort to bike to work one day this week.  Don’t wait for bike to work day (Friday June 11th) because you may have an excuse that morning.  Do it tomorrow, and then, if you can, do it again Friday.