[Closed] Other people's perception of "us"

If it helps, I think 24hr races are probably my idea of hell (tho I've never done one). DId the SDW in a day & won't ever repeat that

some people at work think I disappear off for whole weekends with a spade & mattock, making rad trails (in the new forest 🙂 ). They do think that's funny, but then so do I

My non biking friends think that my Mountain Biking is a lot more sensible than my other hobby which involves carring 100kg of equipment down 100m of cold water to spend about 20 minutes looking for bits of brass off of old shipwrecks, and then spending about 3 hours coming back up again....

I don't do 24hr races. I don't do long distances. When non bikers see what I do, yeah they think I'm crackers. If I didnt DH I'd probably be trying to compete in mma or something/anything for an adrenaline rush which people would think was silly too.

A lot of us are not exactly normal.

there are [b]other[/b] people ??

they think im totally mental 🙁

That for some reason doesn't surprise me Jedi 😆 I think, and i suspect a lot on here think your mental!

I don't really tell them.
Once a guy at work said 'going anywhere nice tonight', to which I replied, yes a few of us are going night riding (this was winter). He just started to tell me what he would be doing, as though he'd miss heard me.
We are all normal, they're all odd. 8)

erm thanks will.......... :O

jedi - Member

they think im totally mental

Yep I think you are mental Jedi but total respect for what you ride tho..

It's the look you get from the "others" in general. I use the trains fairly often and standing on the platform dressed in the garb, with a bike with an odd name with foxshox and rockshox reba's emblazoned on bits of it and of course weird tyre names like Nobby Nic.

I'm thinking of buying a toy ray gun, so the next time someone looks at me as if I've just beamed down from the mothership I can pull it out and say "take me to your leader."

My colleagues can't understand why I enjoy hurting myself at weekends.

People seem astounded when I tell them what I've done and are gobsmacked at a piddling 12 mile ride on a school night - to the point where I'm embarrassed (as 12 miles isn't far) and bluster about it being much harder off road.

Other than that I think people are slightly envious - especially when I show them pictures of places I've been on an evening after work.

No-one thinks I'm mad, although I think anyone who'd ride an MTB for 24 hrs a little bit unhinged.

I've been told that I'm mad just before I was about to set off down Jacobs Ladder.

People seem most surprised at how much money I've spent on a "push bike". The usual exclamation is something along the lines of "..but you could buy a car for that!"
I have a car, and it does me just fine. The rest of my cash is for bikes 🙂
As far as explaining to people what I do with it on the weekends, I tend not to bother unless it's someone who can understand and appreciate what I'm saying. I am most at home on the top of a big hill, and spend most of my leisure time walking back up them. This concept is entirely lost on most of my friends and colleagues.

people use the term "mad" as some kind of compliment. It's bit twisted imho.

I'd be more pleased with a simple "well done you" or "I wish I could". Sometime I think the olds are the only people who are still able to use the english language well.
curse my high IQ and reasonable education :/

Sometime I think the olds

you may have a point...

I sometimes get a slightly patronised feeling from some work colleagues, as though they think I'm a big kid, playing in the woods on my bike. Quite annoying really, especially as there's some truth in it! If only they could see the places we go, distances involved and the skills, strength and fitness required, they'd have a lot more respect. But that would mean leaving the sofa; it's dark and cold out there you know, it might even rain!

Work in the industry so am surrounded by varying degrees of lunacy, to the normo's I speak to they all think we're nuts. The usual remark is 'how much?!!, you could get 10 bikes for that from Toys r Us!'
Even my parents think that at 36 I should find a more responsible passtime ffs.

I live in Germany and everyone here rides a bike of some sort.

Whilst the grown ups cant get there head round heading up the hills on a miserable winters evening to get covered in mud, probably accompanied at any time by a trip to A&E and a constant series of expensive broken bike bits, my mates 12year old kid has recently been proclaiming how cool I am to all and sundry and thats good enough for me!

one of my daughetrs teachers told her that she doesnt realise how cool her dad is as he's seen the videos 🙂

that was wierd

Golf for people who read mens health.

lol

Rorschach - very true!

get ripped abs in 6 weeks....buy mens health pmsl

same as Roter Stern...

A fat fella at work once asked me why I ride to and from work in 'all' weather.

He didn't like it when I explained that I did'nt want to look like him...

The first job I had after uni it took about a year or so for the comments and questions to die down, eventually (being quite a small company) I could sit in the brew room after my ride in still wearing cycling tights and people would just accept it.
When I changed jobs (same industry though) it took me ages to get work to put in a bike shed (comments of "can't you just put a plastic bag over the saddle?" showed their lack of understanding) and even after 2 years people would still ask "HOW far?!" when I told them it was an 8 mile commute. Constant comments about cyclists not paying road tax, holding up the traffic, why didn't I just drive blah blah. Some of it was deliberate winding up, some of it was total lack of comprehension about how anyone would want to go and ride a bike when they had a perfectly serviceable car.

My current job has a secure indoors cycle storage area with workshop, showers, changing rooms with drying facilities, most staff ride to work and various Gold medal winning Olympic cyclists swanning ahout the place. 😉

To turn it round I dont get why you wouldnt ride a bike! That amazing buzz and high you get from it and it last for a few day after a really good spin? Even find my self jealous of commuters when I'm driving home!! 🙄

I have been told I need my bumps felt for hhow much I spend on bikes etc but that's my thinh all bills are paid Kids have every thing they need then my money I'd rather spend on a bike or bits that pissing it down the pub and ignoring the kids all day sunday like some do!

People at work on the whole think I'm mad (especially about the mountain unicycling bit, which I guess is a bit perverse). But for me, getting out on the bike at weekends or in the evening is what keeps me sane.

Yeah alot of my friends think I'm mad. But the majority of my friends do biking as well. Mind you I have a few comments from even them when I told them I was doing Puffer, likewise earlier this year when I did my first Merida. TBH I don't really care what other think I love it. So much to the extent I'll drive in a night out so that I can get up at 8am to go out a cycle in the morning.

People tend to think I am super fit for the road miles/commute. They cannot understand that I can cycle 12 miles faster than they can drive in a car. They also dont understand why I can eat so much and not end up fat 🙄

Also ince when describing night riding they thought I was insane. not least when I described it as a short ride of just 3 hours and 25 miles!

When they see some of the Mountain stuff I cycle down they think I am just a nutter. I once rode a clients BMX outside for a laugh and did a bunny hop then a 180 bunny hop (the limits of my skills) and they thought I was Danny Macaskill.

I always enjoy saying '*only* 15 miles' when people at work ask how far I've ridden in. I'll normally add that I'll make it a bit longer on the way home for fun. Likewise I find it totally bizarre that they'd voluntarily pay a fortune to go and stand in a big stadium and watch 22 overpaid cretins chase a child's plaything around a field for 90 minutes.

Crazy Legs, I'm guessing you work at the Velodrome.. we were discussing coming over for a bit of a staff day out from Llandegla.

i feel much the same about people who sit and watch tv as they do when i tell them i don't. that said i've managed to get a fair few at work out on their bikes, albeit for epic treks of up to ten miles (tho we have to stop for lunch)

i feel envious of the germans, not just for their network of cycle routes, but the numbers of people cycling generally. we should look to emulate....

Generally quite mad, often accompanied with a "try and make it back in one piece to work on Monday morning

Dylan....do some work ya lankystreeko.

When collegues/ people I know* learn of my cycling, I find myself turning into a road traffic version of Johnny Cochrane- to defend my ass against the usual accusations and crap about 'all cyclists are this and that, and don't pay tax etc'
*Please note, I never said 'friends' cos my only friends tend to be made of carbon/ aluminium and titanium.

Everyone I know has called me bonkers, nuts, pshyco, or worse over the years. Guess they don't understand the appeal of really pushing yourself in all conditions.

Plus most of them have gym memberships that have never been used and are scared of the dark.

Even worse for a woman 😕 . . . actually make than an older woman 😉 . They may not understand the ripped jeans and muddy trainers but at least they're not surprised any more . . . when I turn up at work with grazed elbows the first thing said was 'you've been down that skatepark again haven't you?'

high 5's mamadirt!

Totally agree mamadirt.
I was at our local BMX track a few weeks ago. When in cycles a chap with his young lad. The boy shouts 'Dad, Dad come and have a go'.
At this point they hadn't seen me lurking with my young Nephew at the far side.
The Father replies 'no son. I'm far too old'. By this time I'm back at the start, realising the Dad was about 15 years younger than me.

They didn't stay too long, leaving us to make fools of ourselves being big kids.

realising the Dad was about 15 years younger than me.

giggles :o)

When I used to go and mess around at the BMX track or some dirt jumps the kids would all instantly assume I was some rad BMX pioneer from the 70's.

Until they saw me jumping, obviously.