Please excuse the rant. I left it last night, but am still cross about it this morning, so felt the need to vent.

Riding home last night, and I was waiting at some traffic lights. Just as they went green, another cyclist went blasting through the junction, narrowly missing pedestrians who were still crossing the road. Idiot, I thought.

I soon overtook him and got to the next set of red lights, when... yep, you've guessed it, he went barrelling through the busy junction, then went straight ahead.

I waited for the green and took my normal route, jinking left then right, and came out in front of him. I don't think he was happy with that, because he put his head down and overtook me, going straight through the next junction without giving way.

Then, to top it all off, I overtook him again along a main road, and was riding along the bus lane, when a car started reversing into the road. I went to move over to the right of the lane, checking my shoulder as I did so, and there he was... half-wheeling me! He reacted late to me moving, no awareness at all, and then tutted me!

Next set of lights, he literally tip-toed through the junction of slow-moving traffic, blocking a couple of cars who beeped at him, before the lights changed green and I caught him again before turning off.

Now this guy wasn't a newbie cyclist, his kit looked decent and like it had seen some riding, but he was riding like an absolute prick and without any lights which were definitely needed at that time. He had his grubby yellow fluro jacket, shoes, and shorts, and a nice looking road bike, but wasn't keen on me overtaking him because I was in jeans and trainers on my shitty spare bike. I wasn't actively trying to overtake him, I cruise at about 17-20mph, and he was riding slower. Maybe a case of all the gear, no idea.

It's cyclists like him that give the rest of us a bad name, that give legitimacy to the argument of "Those bloody cyclists, always jumping red lights, dangerous to pedestrians, hur hur!" He definitely pissed off more than a handful of people, both pedestrians and drivers, who that evening would have gone home thinking that 'cyclists are arseholes'.

Don't be that guy.

*/rant.