Xplora wrote:high_tea wrote:Now the bad. The rest of this advice is pretty sketchy. Assertive good, aggressive bad. You don't need to ride fast, there's no point catching up to people and berating them and there's absolutely no need to be "hardcore", whatever that means. I, and others, carry kids around on bikes, in traffic. I certainly don't do it by being "hardcore", and I don't ride fast or aggressively. I do make sure I'm predictable, visible and assertive. All of which has been said earlier on and all of which I totally agree with.
Oh, and you totally need to be able to see what's going on behind you. The alternative to using a mirror is turning your head, but if you're not 100% confident in your ability to do that and hold your line (harder than it might seem), just go the mirror.
A first timer's aggressive is simply assertive for the old timer. I am 100% convinced that il padrone is an absolute beast on the bike despite calm assertive nature. He will look like a nutter to all but the seasoned road rider. Aggression puts you in the right starting place for road riding, because you just can't be a sook about claiming a lane, getting up to speed, presenting your case for lane changes. I note that I cop nasty driving every time I want to bludge with a recovery ride. Your posture on the bike defines your treatment. I ride through some pretty quick rat runs in western Sydney. They will wait for 32-35kmh, they won't for 22-25kmh. It's weird but that's the facts.
Riding with kids in traffic sends a whole bunch of different signals to drivers. Children get different treatment to adults.
Catching up to people and blasting them is about establishing a presence on the road. The cowards wouldn't try that crap with another car because they are afraid of damage to their car. If they still don't get it after you give them a couple of choice words, you present the keys to decorate the car. Or better yet, the camera. Few bogans are that stupid to continue. These people are too stupid to realise that their car was a bad investment and that a fit rider can easily average a higher speed than them in peak hour, and they risk a hospitalisation with their poor behaviour. I won't accept that treatment in a car, I won't accept it on the bike.
I see that as assertive behaviour - but many would consider it aggression. You must be a badass if you don't want to get chopped up. When I'm a badass, I don't get chopped up.

Yeah, sure, it's in the eye of the beholder. But both the general advice: BE AGGRESSIVE and the specific advice (ride fast, at a high cadence, abuse random people, look "hardcore") is lousy. Riding with kids is but one example of why it's lousy advice. Want another? I ride the same way on bikeshare bikes. It works just fine. Here's another: I have absolutely no doubt that my every commute is, by your lofty

standards a "bludge". I'd still say I ride assertively, though. The faster you ride, the less time someone has to get impatient and do something stupid, I'll give you that, but Occam's razor tells me it's a pure numbers game, nothing to do with looking hardcore or badass or anything.
Look, some people want to ride fast on their commutes, set PBs and whatever and that's just fine. A lot of us just want to get to work and back with minimum drama and minimum risk and that, too, is just fine. Strange but true, a lot of the advice applies to both groups. Yours, insofar as it isn't just bad advice, only applies to the "hardcore" set. There's no indication that
1) the "hardcore" set is any better off than regular experienced cycle commuters; and
2) the OP is, or wants to be, part of the "hardcore" set anyway.
On reflection, aggressive(as distinct from assertive) riding has one redeeming feature: if I see an incompetent manic (which sums up most practitioners of "aggressive" riding, IME), be it on road, path or track, I leave them well alone, no matter what vehicle I'm operating. I remain unconvinced that this helps their risk profile much, on the whole. You play with fire...