Road Rage

Riding to work this morning I encountered the very darkest of human traits - rage...of the road kind. It all started with me banging on someone's car bonet, though I can confirm that it started about 2 seconds before that when a white van deliberately cut me off as I was conducting an overtaking manouver during the slow-moving morning rush in London.

Banging my open, gloved hand firmly on the van's bonet (the front of the vehicle) was to indicate to the driver that I was there and that the driver almost knocked me over. This is something I've done before in similar situations and I only do it when its really called for as I think that the act is quite rude - and its meant to be, although it does not damage the car. Anyway, in the middle of a traffic jam, this banging brought the driver to attention and he immediately got out the car and walked over to me yelling: " You f***ing litlle p***k, I'll f***ing 'av you!" and made as if he's going to hit me. I held up my arms defensively and he backed off. As an afterthought he kicks my back wheel right in the spokes.

I quietly snapped and walked after the guy, reaching for my mobile phone that has a camera on it. I stood in front of the van as the guy climbs in and quickly set the camera mode up to take a shot. Just as I squeezed off a shot of his license plate he accelerates the van sharply, knocking firstly my bike then me over. I managed to drag my bike and me out of the path of the van as he continued to accelerate. He slipped into the next lane of traffic and crawled away slowly.

I was prepared to go after him, but my chain had come off. I looked down at myself and didn't notice any damages except for a sharp pain on my backside where I fell. I couple of cyclists had seen the incident and helped my get to the roadside. Quite a few people in cars going by asked if I was all right and they said they'd see what happened too. The two cyclists said they'd written down the van's licence plate number and said that they would be prepared to act as witnesses to the police if I reported the incident. I took their details and put my chain back on my bike to continue my journey to work. I noticed that the housing that contains the cogs on my derailleur was bend inwards with the impact of the van's bumper and that my rear wheel was slightly out of true. I later found out that the derailleur hanger was severely bent and had to be replaced.

I later contacted the police from work and gave them all the details. My boss said I should take the afternoon off from work to sort out my bike - which I've just done now. I'm still a bit shaken, but ready to take this van driver on. I've had my fair share of crappy drivers here in London and now I finally feel that some good can come out of at least one of the many incidents I've had since taking up commuting in this city over a year ago. My case looks good and my witnesses are reliable. Even the police said this is a clear cut case - its just a matter of tracking the guy down and taking this to some sort of civil court.

Holiday In South Africa!

After 5 years of living in England I finally managed to get to go back to my home country of South Africa for a 3 week holiday. I would have loved to have taken longer, but this was the most amount of time my company would allow, so I made the most of it.

I had 3 weeks to cram in visiting old friends, spending quality time with family, especially my mom, and at the same time do as much cycling as possible. Not an easy task! It was to Cape Town that I went and my aim was to get a lot of sun for my very pasty white skin and put in some mileage - the only problem is that I didn't take my bike with me, so the plan was to either rent a bike or buy one.

I ended up buying a second hand steel framed bike called an Alpina (I think they're South African bikes) that had shifters on the downtube and some dodgy pedal called Exus that worked with Look cleats. Anyway, the bike was a tank - weighing at least twice as much as my alu bike that was sitting in London, and the gears were not exactly suited for the mountainous roads and passes in and around the Cape: 53/42 x 12/23. Nevertheless, at £80 for the complete bike along with some free adjustments from the bike shop, I wasn't complaining and set off riding in earnest.

Between seeing friends and family and a few days on the beach, I managed to squeeze in 9 days and just over 700km of riding out of the 3 weeks that I spent in Cape Town, and here are some pics I took during those days of riding. The weather was stunning - never above 32 degrees celcius and not below 25, and I only experienced strong winds on 1 or 2 of the days - the rest of the time was perfect.