It blows me away to see how unaware cyclists are of their surroundings. What surprises me the most, is that they have complete disregard for their very own safety. Their own life! What brought this on, was my drive to work today. A short 11km jaunt down Beach Rd, in a constant 60km/h zone. It seems pretty straight forward - until you come across cyclists. Be it one, be it a peloton...

Today was relatively 'entertainment' free on my drive in, even though I did see one woman almost get taken down by, well... herself, in front of a stream of traffic. We had just started moving from a red light, when the cyclist veered across into the 2nd lane beside her. This caused a chain reaction of hard braking by the 8 cars behind her. Once she was clipped in and pedalling, she looked ahead and carried on her merry way, completely oblivious to what she just caused!

A few minutes down the road, and I cam across a peloton of around 15 riders. The group was in the left lane, out of harms way and riding two abreast. Nothing wrong there. But put a parked car in their lane, and the combined brain power of 15 grown men can't arrive at a suitable solution to the problem. I was directly behind the group, and slowed to allow them into my lane, and around the parked car. But no, they had to do it differently...

Keeping in mind that all these men presumably drive cars, and have done so for many years. Keep in mind that they would all be aware of the concept of 'merging' into another lane. But with all that knowledge left at home, the group waited until they were 20m from the car, travelling at 35km/h, and swerved violently into my lane without checking for traffic. What would the scenario be if I had remained at 60km/h and driven past the group, as is lawfully acceptable? Who knows; maybe one cyclist killed, 7 severely injured. And then the process would start, as it always does, with a knockout Newspaper heading.

"Another Cyclist Killed"

Having ridden for numerous years myself, I am aware of the risks involved in riding on a road with 2 tonne cars passing you every 5 seconds. I am also aware of the results, when it all goes horribly wrong! I know little can be done to educate a fool - but surely common sense would rear its head at some point. Surely a cyclist would learn from experience. Kind of like a puppy peeing on your floor. He'll do it once, maybe twice but eventually he'll learn.

Let's just hope it's not the ultimate lesson, that goes relatively unnoticed - before someone catches a wake up.