Beauty, Ciclismo, Cycling

Things I Hate About Cycling

Dr. Martha Andrea Castro Noriega, MD WMA FACS

I love cycling, but these are the things I do not like about cycling:

1. Men cyclists trying to race me when they know perfectly well  I am a cyclist woman  (I have long hair), and especially when they are in their twenties. I am in my 50’s. But I get pumped up and annoyed and I start pedaling my bike so fast that I pass them every single time. 

2. When I am all ready and dressed up to go out for my usual bike ride and the weather decides I should stay home and starts pouring rain!

3. I am pedaling my bike, climbing up a hill, minding my own business and suddenly a cyclist approaches me and begins to give me “cycling lessons”: “you should do this, don’t do that, blah blah blah….” Seriously, some cyclists are so pedantically obnoxious. By now, I completely disregard him, start pedaling fast and leaving him behind, or tell him on his face that I have cycled and raced for 26 years and tell him off.

4. Other cyclists (male cyclists) telling me: “you look so pretty and thin today” “you are gaining some weight back…” “those legs look sexy”. Gee, can they see me as a cyclist, only, please?

5. I don’t like it when I had planned to pedal some 40 to 50 kilometers, I am all pumped up at the 20 or 30 km and then I feel one of my wheels hitting the road flat, pedaling is harder and I know my front or back tire IS FLAT!!

6. I hate it when the weather is beautiful, my physical condition ready to pedal 50 to 80 km the next day. I go to bed early and when I wake up at 4:30 am the evil sneezing and the painful sore throat start. I know I have to stay home so I don’t make it worse and recover faster.

7. I hate when drivers of automobiles scream things at me like: move! get out of the road! …. even worse, when they try to hit me to make me fall (they have never been successful -I have great reflexes)

8. Don’t like it when my bike hits a pothole full of water and I get wet.

9. I hate when friends or relatives agree to meet me at certain time in the morning (usually 5 or 6 am) for a bike ride and they show up late or not at all.

10. I couldn’t think about anything else “I hate about cycling”. There are dozens of things I love about cycling! 🤩

Published by Dr. Martha Andrea Castro Noriega, MD WMA FACS

12 thoughts on “Things I Hate About Cycling”

    1. Oh yes, I noticed that too. I am fearless going down hill on the road. How much is your max km/hr or mph ?

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  2. I too am a bit of a speed freak and there’s a quiet descent where you can see any traffic, I’ve hit 85km/hr on certain stretches.

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    1. 85 awesome! Mine is 78 km/hr, also on certain stretches 🙂

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  3. It is good exercise – I only own an exercise bike now, but used to ride for many years. A drunk driver ran me over and I never got on an outside bike again. Luckily, she was not going fast, pulling out of a bar parking lot. She trashed up my bike, and I was just bruised, mostly on my thighs, some road rash on my legs. Got her license number and gave it to the police who caught up with her two days later. In court she said “the sun was low on the horizon and I did not see this girl” … it was sunny and bright and around 5:00 p.m. She said she stopped to help me and I said I was fine … I told the police she hit me, then took off. A person was sitting on their porch and got up and went back into the house. I will ride again one day. My boss is 71 and rides his bike 20-26 miles a day, depending on his workload. He keeps the bike at the office and rides over to Belle Isle, a big park in Detroit.

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    1. Oh gee, what that woman did to you. That must have been pretty scary. But I am glad that nothing really bad happened to you. What a terrible experience, especially dealing with a drunk and an irresponsible liar.
      Your boss is 71 and still rides 20-26 miles?!! I take my hat off to him, with all respect.

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      1. Yes, and back then I was in college and working all Summer at the diner. I was off one day a week and scheduled the court hearing as my day off … local district court.
        Sat almost an entire day and she got a ticket for a rolling stop and that was it!
        I was furious. The Lincoln Park Police Department, at that time, used our diner for all their prisoner meals. Three times a day they came to pick up the prisoner food and we gave the police free coffee and donuts, so knew most of the police officers, detectives. I gave them a good description of her, the car, and almost every number of the license plate (from memory … didn’t have pencil and paper with me) and I wheeled the bike which had significant damage to the police department a few blocks away. I said she was coming out of the bar parking lot … not even evening for goodness sake. So they located her … I will ride again, but I got the exercise bike shortly afterward so just used that.

        My boss has an exercise bike at the office in a file room and rides it when the weather is bad or during the Winter. Belle Isle has the Grand Prix in June so for three or four weeks preceding the Grand Prix and a week afterward, the island is off limits so he gets bummed out about that. He also swims at least a mile every day at a community pool … every day but Saturday. He is healthy from all the exercise.

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      3. Thanks Martha – I will impress you even more to tell you what day it happened, although that is easy to remember … it was July 4, 1976, the date of the Bicentennial holiday.

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  4. I’m with you for certain on 7, 8 and 9, and one or two others, but try to take it easy on the guys… they’re just trying to chat with you. Competent chicks on bikes are awesome and we don’t always handle that well – I should know, my wife is awesome. Finding the right balance isn’t easy, and you definitely don’t want to be treated like one of the guys – that only sounds “neat” till it happens. 😉

    In some cases, they’re just dopes. Stupid oughta hurt, but you can’t fix it. Maybe cut them some slack. Maybe not.

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  5. Oooh now I feel bad for you! Particularly the one at the end about people saying they’re going to meet up with you and then fail to appear. It’s rude at the best of times, but unforgivable that early in the morning. I’m a newbie to cycling and am doing La Vélodyssée cycling route from north to the south of France in less than a month … any tips? Advice?? Katie x

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