A tale of 2 pictures...

First, the good. See picture to the side. The only thing I can think of when I see a picture like this, or this picture in particular is one thing; don't mess with The Badger. Sure, the man might be all smiles now when he is on the podium at the Tour de France these days acting as a sort of ambassador for the race and all, but I don't think I would have liked to have raced with the man when he was racing. He was mean, and brutal, and would do whatever it took to win. In other words, he was the ultimate and complete bad ass, and he was French. Hinnault was pretty much the man. I mean, he never raced Paris Roubaix before this race, and never raced it again after this race. Essentially, he decided, hey, I haven't won this race, and haven't done it, I guess I had better head out, ride it, and win it. I don't doubt, not for a second, that the man, if he had decided to, could have won it again, and possibly again, and again if he had so chosen. Instead, he won just about everything else out there. We just don't have bike racers like that too much anymore, which is a shame, as I know for myself, I'd love to see the top guys out there slugging it out throughout the season, but I also understand the whole "specialization" thing these days that basically Armstrong brought forth, but I don't have to like it. 

And now we have picture number 2. Now I know what people are going to say about this picture, that hey, at least they're out riding bikes and all. I don't care. I'm kind of a bike snob myself, and this picture just reflects everything that is wrong with large sized group rides out there on the roads of the United States, and why a lot of motorists hate cyclists. You've got 2 people on tandem bikes taking up the entire left lane of the road, not riding as far to the right as they can. You have a guy on a recumbent bike taking up the rest of the lane, plus various other riders behind blocking once again, the entire lane. Now look way back. You have a car, sort of crossing the lane, trying to get past these tool bags. Are they going to let this guy go around? Probably not. What is going to happen is that the person in the car is going to get mad after a short while of not being allowed to pass, and he's going to give the riders the horn as he moves past. The riders, in turn of course, will give the driver the finger, as if they have the right in this case to do that, and then they'll get mad because the driver speed past, even though, it's their fault that they made the driver mad for taking up, not just the entire travel lane, but the opposing lane as well (see picture again, you have people going across the yellow line, which is bad for business, very bad for business). Not only is going across the yellow line just a silly stupid thing to do, it can lead to something we like to call death. You see, it is the weekend warriors seen in this picture that make it harder for folks like myself (who often train alone on the back roads of where we live) to ride our bikes safely, and also it turns motorists into assholes against everyone who rides a bike. Drivers don't know the difference between some choads out for a group ride, and someone out training to be able to race their bike, and they don't care either. All they know is that there is another bicycle in their way. This, I think, is one of the reasons that we now have cyclists getting run over more frequently, and also we have cyclists getting run down on purpose. My whole point in this? Folks, if you're on a group ride, and you find yourself in a small group such as this, get your ass over to the right hand side of the road as far as possible, and stop impeding traffic. I know, and you know, that there are larger group rides where this isn't going to be possible because the group you might be in is going to be larger, but when you have a handful of people, play it smart out there. Get your asses over. You'll be safer, and in turn make the rest of us safer as well.