I took advantage of the fantastic weather down here today to go for an extended ride. Had loads of fun exploring new tracks in the woods and chatting to other riders, horse types and walkers. It was a good day.

On my way home as I got back into the City (the final climb from the trail drops me back inside the City boundry), I saw two (and please don’t accuse me of being racist, it’s what they were) Albanian chaps – 1 on a bike, the other not. Nothing unusal there, I said my usual hello and turned my attention back to the bike.

As I started to ride off I had a sports bag flung at me very hard, missing and slamming into the gate I’d just lifted my bike over, I turned in the direction of the two blokes thinking they were having a ‘laugh’ to see the one on the bike riding directly at my front wheel shouting something at me – I (in no uncertain terms and in a very loud voice) told him to go copulate himself (which seemed to throw him a little) and I got out of his way by which time the bloke on foot was swinging his bag for a 2nd go.

Luckilly this was all happening next to a (very) busy main road and a chap in an SUV slowed down and leant on his horn which distracted the two men giving me a chance to get some speed up. The SUV driver slowed down and drove alongside me and the two men in question ducked into a side road.

When I called the Police to report this and give them a description of the two blokes responsible they weren’t interested at all. The conversation went like this:
Police: Were you hurt?
Me: No.
Police: Was anything taken?
Me: NO, but…
Police: We’re not able to take any action unless you’ve been assaulted or robbed, Sir.
Me: Well thanks an effing bunch *click, brrrrrrr* (Ok, I didn’t, but I wanted to).

So watch yourselves out there, especially if you’re riding alone. The Police won’t be there to help you and they’re obviously getting braver if they’ll try to remove the bike from an owners possession rather than wait for one that’s unattended.

And while there’s a very slim chance he’ll see it (but I reckon he may have been a Cyclist so you never know) a big thanks to the chap in the red Discovery for doing your bit to help me out.

Well done for standing up for yourself and well done to the bystander. Whereabouts in the city was it ?

Thanks Trailmonkey, I think it would have been quite different if the driver hadn’t chipped in. It was near the Esso filling station below the Tesco Roborough roundabout.

Glad you’re okay. Sounds well sketchy.

On a different note, JulianWilson and fatmuthahubbard from STW have been creating loads of secluded singletrack in Cann. I’m sure they’d be glad to show you if you promise not to build poorly constructed kickers all over them.

****, you should’ve unleashed some plymuff on their asses!!!!
we ride a few times a week up cann/robro way drop me a mail if your interested

I promise. No kickers, poorly constructed or otherwise 🙂

Thanks for that fatmuthahubbard, I normally do a loop up through Caan, across the edge of the moors then back down under the Plym valley trail and up through Roborough a few times a week so it’d be good to make it a bit more interesting. Will mail you.

Hate to say it, but give the Daily Mail a ring. Might be a bloody awful paper, but this is the sort of story they love to run, especially w/regard to the complete incompetence of the police.

I’ve actually emailed the news desk of the local rag already, we’ll see if they’re interested in it. They normally like stories about the Police not doing their jobs.

We’ll see what happens next. I’m guessing probably not much.

It might be worth ringing the Westcountry morning news, although they’ll probably drop the story for one about a difficult lamb birth or something! The Daily Mail might give you some money/CRC tokens though.

Surely if you were threatened (which you obviously were) it counts as assault or something?

Glad you’re OK.

Ain’t Britain lovely.

SM – I contacted the Herald which I think is the same as the WMN? Haven’t heard back yet so must have been a big news weekend for them 😉

Julian – They only class it as assault if I’m physically hurt or ‘interefered with’. The really annoying bit is that if I’d stood in the street shouting racist comments at them I could have been arrested but if someone tries to forcibly remove an item from your possession apparently that is OK.

That really stinks, IWH!

The so-called ‘justice’ system in this country is a joke. And it’s not just your story that makes me say that: a mate of mine is being very badly treated by the system we laughingly call ‘justice’.

It strikes me as strange that you can be threatened and nearly robbed and the pigs won’t do anything about it, but a kid putting up posters about his missing cat is threatened with an ASBO and another kid chalking hopscotch squares in a cul-de-sac is scared by overbearing pigs.

Welcome to Britain.

Let’s all get some knives and sort the bitches out!

i knew there was a reason i moved to tavi and not plymouth….

sponging machine, your 6’4″ and built like an outhouse why would you need a knife…!

fatmuthahubbard – I’m 6’3″ and not slight of build, sometimes I think following a courier friends lead and carrying one of those extendable batons isn’t a bad idea!

Anyone heading out today? I’ll be up that way around 4:30 ish.

ulianWilson and fatmuthahubbard from STW have been creating loads of secluded singletrack in Cann. I’m sure they’d be glad to show you if you promise not to build poorly constructed kickers all over them.

whaaaaatttt?!? …but i built a poorly constructed kicker just the other day! Alright, that is overshadowed by the other poorly constructed kickers on that trail. And yes one trail is so secluded it took me some weeks to learn where to find it again.

IWH, do you night-ride? Best way to do all the less, ahem, obvious bits. We are usually out wednesdays and some thursdays: give us a tootle sometime…

knives is wot you need to be tooled up wiv in Plymuff, innit. Put dem bloody effniks in hospitow, bey!

Rather than a baton, maybe we could all get telescopic lances and defend ourselves in a jousting method?

I’d rather run the risk of a couple of Eastern Europeans swinging a bag at me in Plymouth than put up with hordes of blue-rinsed coach trippers bimbling around Tavi and getting in my way all summer. Still, living in North Devon offers me the best (worst) of both worlds.

oh, I’m 6’5″, by the way.

Well, no trouble this time around!

You lot weren’t out last Sunday on a load of big hit bikes were you?

nope i wasn’t out at all sunday( bar nightriding), babysitting my and my sisters kids all weekend.

Then I might have an idea who’s been building the kickers 😉