I just have to tell you what happened this morning. I was driving to a local training group at about 6:00. Some guy was riding close behind me in a jeep Cherokee. I saw a cyclist up ahead, and as I passed him I looked on the rear view mirror to see if it was anyone I knew. The first thing I saw in the mirror was that the guy behind me had veered to the right, way over into the breakdown lane. He was just passing the cyclist, and I was sure he was going to hit him. The side mirror on the Cherokee couldn’t have missed the cyclist’s arm by more than 2 inches. I was so sure that I was about to witness an accident that I started breaking so I could turn around to help the victim. By some miracle, they didn’t collide. I finally noticed that the driver had swerved because he was messing around with his cell phone. He passed me still talking on the phone. When I pulled up next to him I got him to roll down the window.
“Man, did you see that cyclist back there on 98?” I said. “When you veered off the road back there, you missed him by inches.” He went pale. “Oh my god, really? I never even saw him!”
A few minutes later, I was pulling my bike out of the truck and my swim coach pulled up. As soon as I saw what he was wearing, I realized he had been the guy on the bike! He also went pale when I told him the driver never even knew he was there.
Last night I was driving home from dinner and felt compelled to dial 911. There was a guy on the highway that was incredibly drunk. He couldn’t keep his car in his own lane. It was so absurd that I thought someone was actually messing around, no way anyone could be THAT bad right? Anyway I called the police, gave them the tags and a description of the car and followed the guy until I was off the phone. At one point I thought he was going to nail a motorcycle. People are oblivious.
I was struck by a retired pro mountain bike racer who had passed me while reaching down to the floor of his SUV to pick up his garage door opener. He later told me he never saw me. He was profusely apologetic and must have said 50 times how stupid he felt.
He was the last guy to hit me and the reason why I purchased my Computrainer. One inattentive moment by a driver and the cyclist is dead. Why submit oneself to such needless risk, to say nothing of the lousy air quality on our roads?
Thats why I always use my On-Star. No dialing required, hands free…its still distracting though and you still need to be careful, but lots better then dialing and driving with one hand. Its now to the point that “driving distracted” is just as bad as “driving drunk”. There’s way too many “gadets” to play with in the car when you should be driving. Just saw a segment on MSNBC last night about “driving distracted”. It was VERY interesting and scarey at the same time!
Like, dude, this guy behind me swerved off the road just as we passed this other dude on a bike. He like, just missed the dude. I caught up to the dude, like, at the next light, and like, told him he almost like totally creamed the bike dude. He like, freaked out and said “dude!” Later, I found out the bike dude was my swim coach. Dude, is that totally weird or what?