Posts Member

There are plenty of freaking jerks out there, and it sounds like you encountered a few. I hate to say this, but roadies can be total losers sometimes (more than triathletes, IMO).

Posts Member

FTFY

You must not ride much. I tease, I'm sure you ride plenty. Just not with roadies. Roadies are a-holes. Period. I've endured the 'get a real bike' comment before . . . from a fattie on a triple. Two things you have to assume when riding a tri bike: 1) every honk from a car means 'get of the road you moron' and 2) if the bike has hoods, the rider is a self-righteous jerk.

Posts Member

Tri sooner,

I normally ride early morning on weekdays, since I don't go to work till around 1. Also I made a "special trip" to this location for the testing. I normally don't ride because the loop is short, completely flat, and I have a new reason now. Don't roadies ever do time trials? I just liked how the real peloton didn't care less about me, they had better things to do, like riding their bike, but the peloton only pulling 22mph had to make an issue of it.

Posts Member

The pic is close, if it were, the guy would be wearing a jersey that lets everyone know who his cell phone carrier is and the dorky smile would be bigger and he would probably have a tire pump strapped on his bike

Posts Member

Where in the last 30 years did all this animosity between cyclists an triathletes come from. I don't belong to a bike gang or a tri club, but you'd think we have so much in common that we should be best of friends. You don't se alot of marathon runners putting down cross country runners.

I think we should have an international summit, probably in Geneva, and get all the roadies and tri geeks together to figure this thing out. If we can't, we will throw them into a lake 2 miles from shore and tell them to swim back. Then they'll appreciate us.

Posts Member

Have there really been that many negative posts in this thread?

I don't hate roadies, especially since I ride a road bike, and I like biking more than swimming and running, and I ride in groups when anyone agrees to ride with me (which is rare).

But I will say that triathletes, in general, are a more accepting group than cyclists. That's just based on my experience. It probably has a lot to do with my size and "out of shape" appearance. Maybe it's because triathletes know that I'm probably trying to lose weight and be more healthy (and I'll never hold them up in a race). But roadies probably see me as the guy who hangs on the back of the group and never takes a turn at the front because he's too out of breath.

But I have talked to a lot of both, and the triathletes are usually like "that's awesome that you're into triathlon. Which ones are you doing, etc." and the roadies are usually like "what's your average speed" or "what's the longest you've ever ridden" or some junk like this. This is an obvious generalization, but it's has held pretty true in my experience.

Posts Member

I think if you read some of TriSooner's other posts you'll see that he, in fact, trains as a pack-riding roadie from time to time. See hier: http://www.trifuel.com/forum/12488/daylight-savings-time-starts-this-weekend

Therefore, I might take his comments as being ever so slightly tongue in cheek on this topic.

Posts Member

Yeah, i think it can really go either way with anyone. Ive seen some roadies be pretty cool to me on the road, and others be complete dicks. However, ive had the same experience with other triathletes on the road.

What ive personally seen though, which always makes me laugh, is that the nice folks are usually far far better than me, and the jerks are usually pretty unimpressive. And contrary to the above post, ive seen the same thing with runners and swimmers. Guess some people just take life too seriously and cant have any fun. Shame for them.

-Alan

Posts Member

Totally. It might be a pride issue, and if they don't feel great about their own abilities, then they can maybe feel better if they make you feel like crap, or make fun of the way you look in spandex (shed a tear).

Posts Member

RyanWeeg- I was just joking about throwing the roadies into the lake. I think all of the responces on this thread were tounge in cheek. That's what I like about Trifuel is that there are not alot of people here that take things too seriously. Sorry to have offended you.

Posts Member

Absolutely.

Maybe it's because of the nature of the racing? The kind of person who is drawn to the dog-eat-dog road racing scene is going to be a bit more combative in the first place. It's a lot different from racing against a clock.

My other theory is that triathletes all understand newbie-ism better, since almost nobody lines up for their first race confident in all 3 disciplines... they usually have background in one or two, and are just picking up the other(s).

jono

Posts Member

Unfortunately hitting the back wheel will do little to the other guy, and drastically affect your own steering.

As most people agree, you will run into some jerks out there and maybe more of them are roadies because of the competitive attitude, but cyclists in general are pretty friendly, especially to one another. If you have a bad experience don't let it get to you or affect the way you look at roadies during your next ride. You have to try and avoid the bad experiences and at the same time make riding enjoyable for everyone else you meet, so forget about the jerks because they aren't worth your time.