My Pet Peave

This I am guessing is must be my pet peave. I'm doing our friendly ride with Gina and a couple others, Jose and Aimee. We're doing our usual pace, no racing, no aggressive moves towards any other riders. BUT! We see this one guy way ahead of us. The trail is long and flat and you can see for a mile, maybe 2 ahead if you look hard enough, and we weren't.

But at one point we see this dude coming into view. We get closer and closer and I am pulling. I have been for the first 45 miles of our 60 miler as I like to control the pace for Gina, avoiding sprints and gaps making it easier for her to stay with me (fun that way). So maybe 1/4 mile before we catch the guy I ask Jose to take the front while I catch a breather. No problem but I ask him to keep the same pace so he does.

So we roll up on this dude and politely try to pass with a friendly "on yer left". The looks back then sprints away. OK, you're bad! So we continue our pace and this dude fades about 1/4 mile later. OK, no problem, we catch him and begin our pass a second time. You can see in the video we weren't pushing the pace. A second "onyerleft" and we begin the pass. We pass, so I thought only to find that he had latched onto Gina's side. OK, WTF! Fall back but don't freaking bump my wife. I really didn't know what was going on back there assuming we just passed the guy. Next thing I know he calls "onyerRIGHT" and squeezes through, WTF!!

So he does this weak sprint then pulls away like the hero that he is! I feel Jose lift the pace in response so I say "let him go, he'll fade anyway". So Jose backs of the pace and resumes the usual. I'm sort of tickled knowing that he would do something like this as it happens all the time. I'm not sure if it's because I'm a big dude and these hot shots feel threatened when someone of size passes them. Or could it be that they don't like the idea of getting chicked by two gals. Or maybe that Jose looks like a total fred with his compression socks (for vericose veins).

So anyway the dude falls back again but this time he hangs on the back till he recovers. THEN he sprints around again. At least the guy used the left side this time. So he rides off and again I tell Jose just let him go as he's really getting on my freaking nerves by now! We backed off the pace and just let the clown vanish into thin air. Heck, it was way better than having some asshat taking down one of the gals for a trip to the hospital.

I for the life of me can't understand why these asshats insist on interfering with our smooth rides. Heck, if you're fast, then do us a favor and go! If not, then GTF outta the way! Something tells me catching him from far behind means he wasn't fast so he should have just got GTF outta the way so that he didn't hurt any of our riders. Umm, we did a 60 mile ride at a 15.9 average so I guess he felt really special trying to stay ahead of our blistering pace ha ha!

And for those who say it's the trail riders, don't be fooled. When we did our century a couple weeks back, I saw plenty of the foolish and dangerous cyclist behavior on PCH. Like I say, I'm not anti cycling, I'm anti stupid!  ;-)