Yes.
The Return... of the BIKE TRAIL GUYS!
If the Great American Trek Bicycle Making and Pro-Drugged Athlete Propaganda Company went into the proctology business, even it could not produce such a rampant display of assholes on bikes. Riding dangerously on squeaking machines that haven't been touched since the last time they were menacing bike traffic, these magnificent creatures were weaving and bobbing along, doing their thing as I was trying to get home without getting killed by them. There were dozens of them out there, and any keen BikeTrailGuy spotter would have been overwhelmed by the flocks of BTGs, perhaps returned from bike trails in warmer locales such as Richmond.
While riding, it occurred to me that what is needed is a BikeTrailGuy philology, a big field guide to spotting the splendorous varieties of BTG. This will help you pick out the more colorful species in the genus, and if you know a little about BTG behavior, it will help you predict how they will react, and maybe help you keep from getting run over by large herds of them, or individual stragglers running amok. So we begin.
The Shiny Crested Wobbler*
The Shiny Crested Wobbler is indigenous to the bike trails that approach the suburbs, and areas in between large universities and the nearest cheap exurban bedroom community. The Wobbler generally rides a dilapidated mountain bike, usually the lowest end of a premium line that was trendy 10 years ago. The bike itself creaks, partially from loose spokes, partially from chainring rub, partially from rust in the bottom bracket, and partially because the frame is cracked from rusting through or being hucked once by the current owner's older brother, who got it as a Christmas gift and accidentally rode it into the mosh pit near the quad at State U. after one too many beer bongs. Typical wobbler behavior involves positioning the seat way too low, pedaling with knees under the armpits, weaving around, and wearing a baseball cap backward. The spectacular example shown above is an example of the Extreme Bike subspecies, usually found only in suburban areas, where adolescents react to the quandary, "Ride the Bike, or Smoke Dope?" with the response, "Let's do both." This species is not to be confused with the Mexican Crested Wobbler, who is a recent immigrant living in an apartment with ten other similarly situated individuals, and who owns two T-shirts and one pair of jeans, is functionally illiterate, and is a harder worker and probably a better person than you will ever hope to be. The Mexican Crested Wobbler only rides the bike until it can afford a fly-ass car, and following the purchase of said car, stops (shakily) riding his department store BMX bike, because everybody knows bikes are for losers.
The Neon Thrush**
The Neon Thrush, or Supercommuticus Periodicus, is known to imitate the call of other BTGs. Like dedicated, year-round, weather-be-damned commuters, this Thrush has all the gear - shiny jacket, rain pants, walkable bike shoes, and a heavy duty bike with lots of lights. At the office, after commuting, he imitates the Northern Tri-Colored Racer, chirping noisily about the bike, sweating a lot, and looking longingly at food (and only eating it in secret, out of sight of his pack mates, and then in surprising quantities). But there the similarities end. This species is generally only spotted a couple times each year - coincidentally on the first good day of spring, and the last warm day of fall. On those days, it dons all the bike clothing, lights and safety equipment available, and pedals all, or some of the way into work. The Neon Thrush is somewhat rare, as the breed has a tendency to be overcome with heatstroke shortly after starting its semi-annual migration to the office. The Thrush is recognizable by its panting, croaking call; its prostrate position on the side (or shockingly in the middle) of bike trails, and by the greasy, copious trail of sweat that it leaves behind. It is not to be confused with the Randonacious Goose, which dresses similarly and has similar lighting and luggage configurations. The Randonacious Goose, however, does not pant or sweat profusely while in flight, and while it travels at a similar pace, goes much, much farther, and never stops riding its bike, which is heavily lugged, and equipped with a handlebar that is at a very comfortable height, courtesy of a 14" quill stem.
Japonicus Velocitus***
Outside urban areas featuring schools with large post-grad engineering or medical school programs, these are a rare sight indeed. They are so rare, in fact, that this version is an Americanized variation of the breed, which is basically indistinguishable from Hipstericus Fixitis. If you are lucky enough to spot the Japonicus, you will recognize it immediately by the down parka (worn based on calendar date, rather than actual weather, leading to sweaty times just before Memorial Day), inappropriately low seat, incredibly high pedaling cadence, and possibly an older helmet worn backwards - the Bello Reverso variation of the species. The Americanized variation shown above is actually a sort of normal cyclist, perhaps even quite skillful and fast and a nice guy to boot, and should not be confused with the non-native species.
The Hair Legged Kegkiller is found in any large urban area or archetypal college town featuring an abundance of entry-level mailroom and part-time retail jobs. Usually traveling in groups of two or three, these strange birds have a call that typically sounds like "yo dude, wassup? yo dude, wassup?" They are recognizable from their baggy shorts, hairy legs, long hair covered by a do-rag (or possibly $12 standard haircut, from Supercuts) and poorly maintained mountain bikes. The Hair Legged Kegkiller also typically smells faintly of Keystone Light and Melon Ball shooters. They typically are not terrible riders, but the pack tends to expand to fill the space available, such that a herd of three can block an 18' wide bike trail, pondering where good grazing (involving nickel wings, $3 pitchers of draft and "the hotties") may be found.
This Mushheaded Turkey, sadly, is a fairly typical example of the breed. The proper name for the species is Coprocephalus Garybusenymous. Their habitat includes suburbs, large parks, tourist destinations, and bike trails, or any similar place. The Turkey's rationale, apparently, is that in such environs, road surfaces, sidewalks, trees and vehicular traffic are made of soft styrofoam, and are thus unlikely to cause serious head injuries to the Turkey, or deadly crushing injuries to his spawn. The Turkey generally breeds with an attractive but dim bird, Hotchix Withdouchebagious, producing a sizeable brood of offspring that are likely to mature into Turkeys themselves. In fact, despite the dangerous appearance of the conveyance above, the young Turkeys enjoy a genetic adaptation that permits them to survive the typical Turkey upbringing. The adaptation is a simple lack of higher brain functions, precluding the feeling of pain. Following gestation, the Turkey carries his offspring in extra bike seats, a backpack, or simply duct-taped to the bike's stem or one of the fork legs. Not wanting concede the loss of his youthfull turkeytude, the adult Mushheaded Turkey eschews the use of helmets, which "make me look like a dork." So too, gloves, which the Turkey characterizes as, "for pussies." Typical turkey behavior is to pull on to a bike trail, or in front of auto traffic without looking, causing the operator of the other vehicle to lock up the brakes and screech to a halt. Efforts to engage the Turkey in behavioral modification, especially verbal efforts, will generally be met with wild gobbling noises, and other noises that, to the untrained ear, sound rather like a long string of f-bombs. Most Turkey species are immune to constructive criticism.
This strange breed is unsure whether it wants to be a fish, an ostrich, or a velociraptor, so it tries to be all three. Typically found covered in vaseline on bike trails, the Roadrunner prides itself in badly riding foul-handling bicycles, typically whizzing around corners into oncoming traffic, and relying on narrow aero bars that unbalance the bike in order to do what it calls "steering," but which most BTG watchers would characterize as "random swerving." The Roadrunner is also known for not really understanding how bicycles work, and for having absolutely no top end speed, so while they can fly for very long distances, they are easy prey for the cheetah-like Usac's Realracer, or even for the rotund, nearly-flightless Chillicothe's Trackie. The Damp Bottomed Roadrunner is known for storing food all about itself as it rides, and for suffering from terribly debilitating loose bladder syndrome; even pigeons have better bowel control. While Damp Bottomed Roadrunners are often very attractive, especially the female specimens, they are often found by the roadside in an advanced state of bonk, sightless and covered in their own feces. This condition occurs because the profusion of locomotive choices presented by their evolutionary adaptations leave most Damp Bottomed Roadrunners unable to determine whether to shit, or go blind. In keeping with the indecisiveness and greed typical to this species, they then choose to do both, rather badly.
The Northeastern Trail Darter is one of the most common breeds of BTG. It can be found from Maine to Raleigh, and despite its name also periodically pops up in Wisconsin, Dallas, and San Francisco. The Trail Darter is generally affable until passed by any other species of BTG, at which point its genetics kick in and it becomes insanely competitive. The Trail Darter will literally run itself into the ground in order to beat another BTG to the end of the trail, or at least to the next cutoff where a quick exit from the trail and convenient stopping / vomiting point is available. The Trail Darter is the commonly a crash victim, flying into ditches near bike trails the way a swallow would fly into a large plate glass window. Upon crashing, the Trail Darter will typically insist he's okay, and for other inquiring BTGs and BTG spotters to just keep riding along - exactly as the Trail Darter is doing in the photo above. It's distinctive call after crashing, throwing up, or being ridden off the wheel repeatedly by a longsuffering Usac's Racer attempt to let him wheelsuck is, "I'm okay. I'm okay."
Rest assured, he is not.
The Vibrant Plumed Wannabe is characterized by its bright plumage, consisting of feathers that it did not grow itself, and other feathers plucked from the remains of extinct species, such as the Yellow Doping Phonak, the Bluecheat Discovery Bird, and the ever popular Yellow Jerseyed Grantour. While this bird looks fast, and can sometimes even go fast for up to a mile, it is generally quite slow and not as adept at flying as it would like to be, mainly because it doesn't actually fly very often. Typical Multi-colored Wannabe behaviors are attempting to race other species on the bike trails, riding dangerously to pass other other birds, an inability to fly in a straight line or at constant speed, and harsh, condescending looks it shoots at a predatory species it considers rivals, particularly the brightly plumed Usac's Realracer, or its cousin, Professor Workaday's Neon Fastcommuter. The image above is an actual picture of a meeting of the Bright Plumed Wannabes. It is worth noting that their bike handling skills tend to be somewhat lacking. Also note the colorful Wannabe display in the bottom right hand corner, which some believe to be a futile Wannabe attempt at mating. BTG watchers suspect that Wannabes reproduce by assexual reproduction, since there don't appear to be any females in this species.
* Saw several of these today. Sad.
** There were too many to count. The trail was awash in sweat.
*** The guy who is usually out there, who frequently wears his helmet backwards, actually wasn't around today.
**** Saw just a single herd of these, ambling slowly north on the Cap Crescent.
***** Several of these were out in Bethesda, some accompanied by the female variation of the species.
# Nearly got hit by one of these, who came around a turn on the Cap Crescent, helmetless, losing control as he "cornered."
## Saw one of these too. A couple of his herdmates were there, gathered around the fallen road warrior. I asked if he needed help. "I'm fine" he croaked. But he wasn't. I know shock when I see it.
### None of these were out yesterday. In all likelihood, they are having their Madones, Orbeas and Colnagos cleaned at the local bike shops. They'll be out soon enough.
Outside urban areas featuring schools with large post-grad engineering or medical school programs, these are a rare sight indeed. They are so rare, in fact, that this version is an Americanized variation of the breed, which is basically indistinguishable from Hipstericus Fixitis. If you are lucky enough to spot the Japonicus, you will recognize it immediately by the down parka (worn based on calendar date, rather than actual weather, leading to sweaty times just before Memorial Day), inappropriately low seat, incredibly high pedaling cadence, and possibly an older helmet worn backwards - the Bello Reverso variation of the species. The Americanized variation shown above is actually a sort of normal cyclist, perhaps even quite skillful and fast and a nice guy to boot, and should not be confused with the non-native species.
Hair Legged Kegkiller****
The Hair Legged Kegkiller is found in any large urban area or archetypal college town featuring an abundance of entry-level mailroom and part-time retail jobs. Usually traveling in groups of two or three, these strange birds have a call that typically sounds like "yo dude, wassup? yo dude, wassup?" They are recognizable from their baggy shorts, hairy legs, long hair covered by a do-rag (or possibly $12 standard haircut, from Supercuts) and poorly maintained mountain bikes. The Hair Legged Kegkiller also typically smells faintly of Keystone Light and Melon Ball shooters. They typically are not terrible riders, but the pack tends to expand to fill the space available, such that a herd of three can block an 18' wide bike trail, pondering where good grazing (involving nickel wings, $3 pitchers of draft and "the hotties") may be found.
Mushheaded Turkey*****
This Mushheaded Turkey, sadly, is a fairly typical example of the breed. The proper name for the species is Coprocephalus Garybusenymous. Their habitat includes suburbs, large parks, tourist destinations, and bike trails, or any similar place. The Turkey's rationale, apparently, is that in such environs, road surfaces, sidewalks, trees and vehicular traffic are made of soft styrofoam, and are thus unlikely to cause serious head injuries to the Turkey, or deadly crushing injuries to his spawn. The Turkey generally breeds with an attractive but dim bird, Hotchix Withdouchebagious, producing a sizeable brood of offspring that are likely to mature into Turkeys themselves. In fact, despite the dangerous appearance of the conveyance above, the young Turkeys enjoy a genetic adaptation that permits them to survive the typical Turkey upbringing. The adaptation is a simple lack of higher brain functions, precluding the feeling of pain. Following gestation, the Turkey carries his offspring in extra bike seats, a backpack, or simply duct-taped to the bike's stem or one of the fork legs. Not wanting concede the loss of his youthfull turkeytude, the adult Mushheaded Turkey eschews the use of helmets, which "make me look like a dork." So too, gloves, which the Turkey characterizes as, "for pussies." Typical turkey behavior is to pull on to a bike trail, or in front of auto traffic without looking, causing the operator of the other vehicle to lock up the brakes and screech to a halt. Efforts to engage the Turkey in behavioral modification, especially verbal efforts, will generally be met with wild gobbling noises, and other noises that, to the untrained ear, sound rather like a long string of f-bombs. Most Turkey species are immune to constructive criticism.
Triple Crested Damp Bottomed Roadrunner#
This strange breed is unsure whether it wants to be a fish, an ostrich, or a velociraptor, so it tries to be all three. Typically found covered in vaseline on bike trails, the Roadrunner prides itself in badly riding foul-handling bicycles, typically whizzing around corners into oncoming traffic, and relying on narrow aero bars that unbalance the bike in order to do what it calls "steering," but which most BTG watchers would characterize as "random swerving." The Roadrunner is also known for not really understanding how bicycles work, and for having absolutely no top end speed, so while they can fly for very long distances, they are easy prey for the cheetah-like Usac's Realracer, or even for the rotund, nearly-flightless Chillicothe's Trackie. The Damp Bottomed Roadrunner is known for storing food all about itself as it rides, and for suffering from terribly debilitating loose bladder syndrome; even pigeons have better bowel control. While Damp Bottomed Roadrunners are often very attractive, especially the female specimens, they are often found by the roadside in an advanced state of bonk, sightless and covered in their own feces. This condition occurs because the profusion of locomotive choices presented by their evolutionary adaptations leave most Damp Bottomed Roadrunners unable to determine whether to shit, or go blind. In keeping with the indecisiveness and greed typical to this species, they then choose to do both, rather badly.
Northeastern Trail Darter##
The Northeastern Trail Darter is one of the most common breeds of BTG. It can be found from Maine to Raleigh, and despite its name also periodically pops up in Wisconsin, Dallas, and San Francisco. The Trail Darter is generally affable until passed by any other species of BTG, at which point its genetics kick in and it becomes insanely competitive. The Trail Darter will literally run itself into the ground in order to beat another BTG to the end of the trail, or at least to the next cutoff where a quick exit from the trail and convenient stopping / vomiting point is available. The Trail Darter is the commonly a crash victim, flying into ditches near bike trails the way a swallow would fly into a large plate glass window. Upon crashing, the Trail Darter will typically insist he's okay, and for other inquiring BTGs and BTG spotters to just keep riding along - exactly as the Trail Darter is doing in the photo above. It's distinctive call after crashing, throwing up, or being ridden off the wheel repeatedly by a longsuffering Usac's Racer attempt to let him wheelsuck is, "I'm okay. I'm okay."
Rest assured, he is not.
Vibrant Plumed Wannabe###
The Vibrant Plumed Wannabe is characterized by its bright plumage, consisting of feathers that it did not grow itself, and other feathers plucked from the remains of extinct species, such as the Yellow Doping Phonak, the Bluecheat Discovery Bird, and the ever popular Yellow Jerseyed Grantour. While this bird looks fast, and can sometimes even go fast for up to a mile, it is generally quite slow and not as adept at flying as it would like to be, mainly because it doesn't actually fly very often. Typical Multi-colored Wannabe behaviors are attempting to race other species on the bike trails, riding dangerously to pass other other birds, an inability to fly in a straight line or at constant speed, and harsh, condescending looks it shoots at a predatory species it considers rivals, particularly the brightly plumed Usac's Realracer, or its cousin, Professor Workaday's Neon Fastcommuter. The image above is an actual picture of a meeting of the Bright Plumed Wannabes. It is worth noting that their bike handling skills tend to be somewhat lacking. Also note the colorful Wannabe display in the bottom right hand corner, which some believe to be a futile Wannabe attempt at mating. BTG watchers suspect that Wannabes reproduce by assexual reproduction, since there don't appear to be any females in this species.
* Saw several of these today. Sad.
** There were too many to count. The trail was awash in sweat.
*** The guy who is usually out there, who frequently wears his helmet backwards, actually wasn't around today.
**** Saw just a single herd of these, ambling slowly north on the Cap Crescent.
***** Several of these were out in Bethesda, some accompanied by the female variation of the species.
# Nearly got hit by one of these, who came around a turn on the Cap Crescent, helmetless, losing control as he "cornered."
## Saw one of these too. A couple of his herdmates were there, gathered around the fallen road warrior. I asked if he needed help. "I'm fine" he croaked. But he wasn't. I know shock when I see it.
### None of these were out yesterday. In all likelihood, they are having their Madones, Orbeas and Colnagos cleaned at the local bike shops. They'll be out soon enough.
10 comments:
Ooooh! First commenter! Dude, a podium. This entry is good enough to earn a spot on the top-10 alltime pantheon.
- KenBob
Yeah, I guess that is some pretty high quality playa hatin'.
There only morons that pissed me off were the idiots without helmets. One guy tried to race me as I'm smoothly motorpacing across town, just tooling along doing 25 behind a silver Audi, and we caught all green lights from the WH to G-Town. Dude's on a Bianchi, lime green tights, 3 T-shirts, Chuck Taylors, no helmet. He keeps doing these standing sprints (in traffic, mind you), losing steam, and dropping off to the side. He gets caught in traffic, I go on, traffic slows a bit at one of the goofball intersections, I notice he's run the red light to keep up his "race". Same thing at the GW Circle. On the upside, he won't be in the gene pool very long riding that way... Then there was this trithlete who nearly pegged me on the Cap Crescent, hammering all out downhill (yeah, good training value in that) and swerving all over the trail, like there was a cash bonus for it. No helmet either. Lovely. Tons of bad bike handlers with no helmets on out riding yesterday. Just blew me away how many people were riding without skid lids, especially after seeing Rich F. laid out in Nellysford, with that shattered and crushed Bell, but his skull intact. If you're going slow, no obstacles, nice weather, I can see going without the helmet. Or winter training, LSD, 14 MPH, I can *almost* see wearing the cycling toque. But on a crowded bike trail, with joggers, baby strollers, 'bladers, most of them weaving, wobbling, dangerous trail users? No. Does not compute.
I had a Rollicus Unholicus spotting yesterday! You were upbound, I was downbound. Perhaps you recognized my genus - Starred and Barred Overcooked Noodle Legged Recoverus. I still can't figure whether getting to HP by fighting against rush hour flow on the streets is more or less dangerous than on the trail.
Two more species I recorded last night. The Trail Hogging Twin Breasted Slow Roller, an oblivious conversational 4 wheeled species that takes up so much trail space that opposing traffic is forced to nearly ditch off the trail down the precipice and onto Canal. Then at HP we had Lappicus Singlespeedimus. I didn't understand this - the full hipster urban too cool for school obligatory colored deep dish rims and the whole nut - doing slow rolling laps at the Point. Huh?
That was you? Shit. You should have flipped me off or mocked my ancestry or something so I would have recognized you. Sorry I blew on by, but I was pretty deep in L1 recovery riding at that point and couldn't have talked if I had wanted to. I was also engrossed in thinking about the hot date I had scheduled with some Kung Pao Chikkin.
Hey, was the Twin Breasted Slow Roller an unhelmeted male/female combo? If so, the male half of the Siamese Twin nearly took me out. I don't get the slow SS gig at Hains. Maybe he was appreciating the Cherry Blossoms, and the scantily clad tourists, showing pale legs after a long wintered. Then again, people probably don't get me riding slow recovery laps at Hains either, so what do I know.
The displays of amazing Pathleticism are certainly on the upswing.
I won't be on the Custis/W&OD/Mt. Vernon until it's heatstroke hot. There must be discomfort to weed these fickle birds out. It's Hill of the North (Arlington) for the foreseeable future.
The CCT? I'd NEVER ride that thing. Too much pre-programmed hate and rage. It's like the peds create situations specifically designed to precipitate the confrontations they seem to crave. You know, so they can go write an angry letter to the editor about it.
Take heart, though. Remember the first nice day of spring in college? Frisbees, hacky-sacks, reggae, a full quad. The second nice day? Crickets.
These delicate species will do Bike To Work Day, get rained on, and hang the accessoried-out hybrid right back up.
Jim,
This is really great that you went ahead and did this. I was thinking of doing something similar last year. But I was going to do it like gwadzilla does it with Bike Messengers, but with the people of the trail and comment on them. Now that I do not live near the Mt. Vernon trail I kind of miss the buffoonery of people. Last year I spotted many recumbent cyclist. One guy had no shirt on and was smoking a cigar on the trail. Pretty funny.
And there is this old lady who rides her Pomeranian dogs in the trailer. I would see her everyday.
There were many people with Ipods with no helmets along with walkers with ipods just makes for a dangerous combination.
Along with the occassional James Carvel sighting, it made for an exciting ride everyday.
Well done Jim. Another classic
Quite a great read, very clever (and unfortunately very true)
Funny and true but if we wanted to read BSNYC, we would go to his site, not yours.
Speaking of derivative... that's not even the first time I've heard that. C'mon, can't you do better than that, like some digs about how I'm fat and slow on hills, or that you're banging hotter chicks than I am? If this is going to be a blog slapfight, you gotta throw me a bone here and give me something at least remotely worth slapping at. That was barely worth responding to.
BTW, anonymous insult lobbing like you laid on Walter and Kyle is pretty gutless. There's about a million insulting things I could say about it but cowardice can stand on its own two legs. Well, to the extent that its knees aren't buckling.
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