Interesting bias in the Miami Herald article.

The article title: Pack of bicyclists crashes into car
The last sentence (at least at the time I am reading the article):

Investigators were on scene to determine how the incident happened.

Yet, the paper seems to know that the cyclists crashed into the car.

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Behold the turtle! He makes progess only when he sticks his neck out. (James Bryant Conant)
GET OFF THE F*%KING WALL!!!!!!! (Doug Stern)
Brevity is the soul of wit. (William Shakespeare)

Key quote from the morons:
I am really glad to see that somebody has finally acted on their primal impulses to mow down these idiots that pack up and block traffic in their tight pants. Last time I checked there were no license plates on their bikes, that makes them secondary to paying customers CARS ! They should not be allowed to clog roads and use only designated bike lanes where available.

Austin79 can confirm, every time a cyclist is hit down here, it usually reads "cyclist crashes into car" or something to that effect...we have some of the worst drivers I have ever scene. It is pretty bad here, I think it has alot to due with all the different cultures that live in South Florida, and everyone being used to driving like they used to in their country and with different styles.

The article now says that they collided with a car and the accident was caused "when a car pulled right in-front of them and struck them."

saltamontes pretty much nailed the atmosphere there. lots of bad drivers and people coming from all over the world bringing their countries' 'rules of the road' with them... as he noted, the blame almost always falls on the cyclists... i was hit when a dude ran a red light, and i hit the side of his car. the police report said that i hit him (and did not mention that he was at fault).

how hard is it to see 40 guys in colorful lycra??

Check the second link.
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It doesn't really matter what Phil is saying, the music of his voice is the appropriate soundtrack for a bicycle race. HTupolev

oh yeah... that's beyond bad.

I was out with some friends riding on Sun. on a County Road and this car decided to turn right, right in-front of us. We were in a 2x2 formation. The 2 riders on the outside were able to veer to the left into the County Road to barely miss the back end of the car. I was in the front on the inside. I probably had less than 2 or 3 seconds to figure out what to do, but was unable to come up with a good plan and nailed the rear of the moving vehicle at roughly 16-18mph. The guy behind me had an additional second or two to slow down and missed the car, but ran over my P3C. I don't remember the impact. I woke up on the ground about 10 feet away with my body rotated 90 degrees from the last position I was in. I was taken to the hospital via ambulance. My outcome was pretty good, no broken bones, I just have some good bumps and bruises, a sore jaw and just some road rash on one ass cheek.

Why do people do stupid things like this, all she had to do was wait 2-4 seconds for us to pass the intersection. If she would have been a second or two later she would have taken all 4 of us out, just like what happened in FL.

I ride there a lot, its freaken stupid dangerous. Cars/trucks are always parked in the cycling lanes becuase of construction or repairs somewhere around the neighborhood. The pack that was hit rides somewhere around 30+ mph and they have a race the last 30 min of their practice in which they fly. The peloton is sooo big it takes up not just the cycling lane but also the car lane. Most locals are used to it and know when the team is out there and drive careful but it there are a lot that speed right through and honk as if its something new.

From what was reported in local news is that there were cars including a cop car ILLEGALLY parked in the cycling lane and forced the peloton on the rd, when the driver pulled out to see if there was a car the first cyclist hit him and was a chain reaction afterwards. It sucks to ride bike down here with the drivers, Key Biscayne last wknd a female rider the day before a sprint flew off the bike after an entire peloton passed her on the left except for one guy, he clipped her and she fell off and broke her ankle had to be taken to the emergency room. Ive met 2 riders i train with that got hit by cars and spent significant time in the hospital last yr. And now this small 3.8 mile loop near my house has this accident. Freaken drivers!!!!!!!

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"Fear is what drives you in the last part of a marathon in an Ironman. The body is depleted and the mind is fuzzy. Short course racing is driven by power and finese at the end of a race, Ironman demands so much more and is driven by will and mental strength." Chris McCormack

10/28/08 Dev Paul had 400w FTP!!!

Yes, drivers can be bad. However, I've witnessed several collisions of bikes hitting (or nearly hitting) cars who had the right of way and the cyclists failed to yield right of way. It drives me bonkers when I'm stopped at a stop light with cross traffic at dusk with lights and a helmet, and some idiot goes past me through the intersection with no helmet or lights and wearing headphones. I'm amazed if they even noticed the car that had to stop to avoid hitting them. Now don't even get me started about drivers with cell phones. Never underestimate the predictability of stupidity. How on Earth did we get 6 billion people?

P.S. My favorite was seeing a guy in his aerobars hit a parked car. I have no clue, because it was parked legally. He was looking straight at it. The only think I can think is that he was too wrapped up in his music and/or thoughts (listening to headphones).

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"Most of my heroes don't appear on no stamps"
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That sucks, best wishes.

Updated story in this morning newspaper.

http://www.miamiherald.com/...es/story/218587.html

once again read the comments section to the story...interesting

I just read and added a few comments. I also noticed the anti bike comments seem to be aggressive. How about adding a few pro bike comments too! STer's are pretty good at "comments".

Support Crew

When a beloved heart surgeon and devoted cyclist was hit and killed in my city earlier this year the next day newspaper headline was "LOCAL DOCTOR KILLED IN BIKE CRASH". What happened was that he was hit from behind by a woman in a minivan, run over, went under the van and was spit out to the other side of the road. Yet the headline implies HE was at fault. Yes, a "bike crash" is what happened, not "driver accident" or "vehicular homicide". No one in the mainstream media would ever challenge citizens right to their cars and the road.

Hey do you train with SFT?

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"Fear is what drives you in the last part of a marathon in an Ironman. The body is depleted and the mind is fuzzy. Short course racing is driven by power and finese at the end of a race, Ironman demands so much more and is driven by will and mental strength." Chris McCormack

10/28/08 Dev Paul had 400w FTP!!!

CNN is apparently going to show a clip on the incident. They're teasing it as "Car Hits Cyclists"

The ignorance of the anti-bike comments is frightening. There are a few people who sound like they would like to go out and mow down the next cyclist they see.

I am so thankful I don't live there anymore...

Best wishes to the injured, hope they recover well and are on the road again soon.
Bad stuff and there are definitely some ignorant comments (from both sides of the fence). As a cyclist I fully support our right to the road but I have to somewhat agree with the folks saying that you can't have your cake and eat it too. We can't use the law to defend our right to the road then treat the laws that inconvenience our use of those roads as something that only applies to cars. It was irrelevant in this case but the comments about cyclists blowing stop signs, yields, speed limits and lights are valid. I see it all the time where I live. I do it myself occasionally. Yes, it sucks to be moving along at a good pace and having to stop... but sometimes that sucks in a car too. You still have to do it.
Don't take this as defending impatient, roadrage fueled idiots and no-life losers in motor vehicles that feel the need to vent their sad existence on cyclists. I know there are all too many of them out there. I'm lucky in that I live in a small, remote town with a lot of foot and bike traffic and the vast majority of drivers here are very courteous but even here I rarely push my luck with stop signs and yields. No way I'd do it in busy, angry big-city traffic. Actually, I'm not even sure I'd ride in that anymore. I'm spoiled now with the open, very low traffic, surrounded-by-wilderness highways I have here.

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"A bucket...if you haven't puked in it you could be going harder."
- Lazy Ben

I live, ride and train in Miami and surrounding areas and to tell you the truth, even though the cultural thing is to blame the cyclist first, same as with when a car strikes a pedestrian we all assume is the drivers fault, i am going to be really honest. First the city of Miami, besides Key Biscaye and some parts in SW dade county plus Homestead's back roads dont either have bike lanes or safe streets to ride a bike on unless you are very careful and lucky (too narrow roads no shoulder). A lot of this recreational riders dont know how to properly handle a bike ( I am not saying this is the case here) and dont respect a lot of the traffic laws you need to obey if you are riding on the road sharing with vehicles. I have gotten myself into the "pissed off motorist" mood more than once and I am a cyclist and try to always be as careful as possible but there is really no reason to ride 4 or 5 abreast on the road. In some roads even double pace line is dangerous (ie Old Cutler and Main Hwy for the ones familiar with the area) and actually impacts traffic a lot and I see this selfish people doing it week in and week out. Also stop signs, lights and the likes are to be obeyed, tons and tons of people here dont think those apply to cyclist. Yes, i am guilty of taking lights and signs if I am completely sure there are not cars in the vecinity and if anything happens it will be my fault for doing so, but some people think that because they are riding in a pack cars are just going to stop no matter what.

Anyhow, I am not placing blame on anyone because details are not clear but the same way this city has the worst drivers in the country i also has some of the most moronic riders.

Peace

PS hope they are all doing well and the incident gets clarified because that is very popular loop.

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Not to be a pain in the ass, but 40 bikes riding in a pack doesn't seem very safe. Were they riding 2-3 across? I really think bike packs should be about 10 max single file. If you have 40 riders group it by ability and have 4 groups of 10.

For one I would be scared to death riding that fast down that street. Bike lanes with parked cars, lines of sight blocked. You wanna know why drivers hate cyclists, because when things like this happen we always tend to place the blame on the drivers. This could have very easily been one car hitting another. Seems like the guy in the car was trying to pull out from a driveway, line of cars was blocking his view, and he might have realized the bikes were coming fast and gunned it trying to get out the way? Or what if a kid had stepped out from between the cars and been mowed over by the pack of riders? Was it the kids fault?

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If a kid runs out from between 2 parked cars and gets hit (by car or bike) it is probably the kids fault. Not that I am saying hit the kid, but come on. Of course if you are riding (or driving) next to a row of parked cars you shhould be going a "reasonable" speed to be able to react to these kinds of things.

I avoid riding places like that because i can. I know some poeple have no choice.

Who knows how many across they were, but you'd never see a single-file "pack" around here (unless there's a major breakaway!). It's quite common on a different group ride down here that the group will take the entire lane, for the entire ride....3-5 riders across. Must be a group about 40-50.

In Greensboro, we have a local Tuesday Ride that has close to 100 riders at times. It does split up, and starts pretty far outside of town.....but it is often too big and uncontrollable for the first 5-10 miles or so. Just about every week there is some sort of "incident" that takes place....but I have to admit, I love it, and am out there every week I can be there.