Why do mtbers tend to be such decent people?

Naveed

I know it may sound like a generalisation, but I can't ignore the fact that cyclists and mtbers in particular tend to be of decent stock.
Whenever I meet fellow mtbers on the trail, it's always a case of respect and a friendly greeting, I've also lost count of the amount of times I've chatted to fellow mtbrs on route to a trail via train, or even chatting to the lads at my local Evans store.

Do I have a point?

Daz555

f*** off.



Nah, I agree. One or two selfish idiots about but generally a good bunch.

allthegearnoidea

were all out for the same thing! and dopnt mind stopping to natter, rather than worrying about average times and speed etc!
got to admit, i make a point of saying a cheery hello to all the walkers and other cyclists i see even Roadies!! although the most i ever get back from them is an acknowledging nod or smile loL!

weeksy59

It's not just MTB people but people within a social group.

I get the same with Motorcyclists, football fans and people from Liverpool.

If you mix with people with similar interests, the odds are your experience with them will be pleasant

Dirtydog11

f*** off.

LOL

scottgeniusltd2005

yeah except bloody rude people in east lancs, on trails nice as pie, on the tar, bloody ignorant, i can wave and say hello to maybe 20 riders on a ride and only get 1 reply if i'm lucky!!!! why are you lot in grotty rotty / bacup / stacksteads / sharneyford so bloody ignorant??? yet when i cross the border back into burnley everyone who pass acknowledge a wave or hello. what's THAT all about?

Tim.s

Agreed, I always make an effort to be friendly when out riding, You never know when you might need to sponge an innertube of someone

Got chatting to a chap on the Freeride section at Cwmcarn a while ago, he was on a Mongoose Kyber and when I mentioned that id read a good review on the bike he positively insisted that I took it for a spin!!! There seems to be a mutual trust between MTBers I think.

BorisSpencer

Yeah, I find MTB folk very freindly when I'm on my bike.
Stopped for a chat with a couple of guys in a 4x4, who were winching themselves out of a mudhole on a greenlane near us. They assumed we were coming over for a slanging match.

I use the rights of way around me as a walker, cyclist, and 4x4 driver and I can assure you walkers and bikers are generally only friendly decent people within their own peer group

.blitz

Naveed wrote:

I know it may sound like a generalisation, but I can't ignore the fact that cyclists and mtbers in particular tend to be of decent stock.

Generally I'd agree but there's still a hardcore snob element and some people take MTBing soooooooooo f*cking seriously it's untrue.

The Northern Monkey

Agreed that we are a happy bunch

however i don't like the whole "bike envy" thing.... when you 1st turn up to trails ec and eveyone stops to check out what you've got. kinda daunting. but then again, I do it too

Furbes

bigbenj_08 wrote:

Agreed that we are a happy bunch

however i don't like the whole "bike envy" thing.... when you 1st turn up to trails ec and eveyone stops to check out what you've got. kinda daunting. but then again, I do it too

Who doesn't :!: :!:

passout

scottgeniusltd2005 wrote:

yeah except bloody rude people in east lancs, on trails nice as pie, on the tar, bloody ignorant, i can wave and say hello to maybe 20 riders on a ride and only get 1 reply if i'm lucky!!!! why are you lot in grotty rotty / bacup / stacksteads / sharneyford so bloody ignorant??? yet when i cross the border back into burnley everyone who pass acknowledge a wave or hello. what's THAT all about?

I've found the same when on my road bike in the Trough & Forest of Bowland, strange. Mind you MTBers can be unfriendly - I was in the Lakes recently and held a gate open for a fellow MTB'er...not a word or acknowlegement. Some very freindly walkers were there and commented on how rude the guy had been! Personally I think most countryside users are pretty friendly or at least civil, it's just the minority as ever.

pyebibby4

weeksy59 wrote:

I get the same with Motorcyclists, football fans and people from Liverpool.

quote]

i am sorry but football supporters are in no way a nice bunch! u put a team of rugby players, and a team of football players together... the footballers would just be out for a fight! its ridiculous!!

projectsome

it's simple, there's nothing to stress you out on the bike. you just take your time, smile when you ride past traffic jams and say to yourself "unlucky mate!"

It's much better than walking especially when going downhill.

oh and the view is excellent (I ride to the top of Ashton Court in Bristol just to enjoy the view)

Fit men/women ride bikes :roll:

pyebibby4

projectsome wrote:

Fit men/women ride bikes :roll:

ace

whydoesitalwaysrainonme

yeah except bloody rude people in east lancs, on trails nice as pie, on the tar, bloody ignorantquote

I can sort of explain (being a roadie and MTBer), it is because about 50% of roadies dont do MTBing and resent MTBers because they think they are lazy sods etc etc, and also they think all MTBers hate roadies so generally dont say hello and also they see it as a completely different group (just as you dont great footballers when you're on a bike, i dont agree with this personally but quite a few roadies are like that.

mongoosed

I find most mtbers are friendly,always say hello when you meet them and in my local bike shop they're a helpful bunch.

ThanksBye

Like the other day, i was holding gate open for horserider, and all i got was this most disgusting look, as if i shouldnt have been on the bridalway

supersonic

Secretly I am an utter barstard.

KnightofCydonia

funny you should say this. Today I went past the first person who didn't return a greeting in passing. he nearly shoved me off the cycle path to, a roadie done up from head to toe in lycra. Plenty of room for two of us, he was coming at me so I moved across, he did too & pretty much shoved me onto the grass. Everyone else, walkers, dog walkers, mtbers have all been very polite.

KnightofCydonia

tomatoevousparlour wrote:

Like the other day, i was holding gate open for horserider, and all i got was this most disgusting look, as if i shouldnt have been on the bridalway

don't get me going on them. the amount of horse squit everywhere is disgusting. I'm tempted to put an open letter in our local paper telling them to clean up or bugger off. it's filthy, disgusting and sooooo much of it.

whydoesitalwaysrainonme

oh i hate horses, they sh** all over the road, the riders are all stuck up posh bar stewards/female dogs then they happily use cycle paths (and sh** all over them!) and then have a go @ you for going on bridlepaths. And then they try telling me i HAVE to get off my bike when i see a horse and walk it past them and have a go and tell me to slow down at me when i slowed down to literally 2 miles an hour. And then to top all of tht their horses jump off the side of the road or at me and they say cyclists shouldnt be on the road! at least i can control my bike they cant control their horses. it was good to get tht off my chest :twisted: :twisted: :twisted:

projectsome

whydoesitalwaysrainonme wrote:

oh i hate horses, they sh** all over the road, the riders are all stuck up posh bar stewards/female dogs then they happily use cycle paths (and sh** all over them!) and then have a go @ you for going on bridlepaths. And then they try telling me i HAVE to get off my bike when i see a horse and walk it past them and have a go and tell me to slow down at me when i slowed down to literally 2 miles an hour. And then to top all of tht their horses jump off the side of the road or at me and they say cyclists shouldnt be on the road! at least i can control my bike they cant control their horses. it was good to get tht off my chest :twisted: :twisted: :twisted:

lol my neice has a horse, i hope she doesn't turn up like that (she only does competitions though)

where i ride, horse riders are generally ok.

There was one occassion where I almost crashed into a horse.

There's a loooooooooooong path in ashton court that goes round and there's a bit of a blind bend. Following the blind there was a horse rider.

Eranu

In my experience roadies are just as nice a MTBers. I don't see as many roadies but when I do I always say hi and most of the time they respond.

The other week I even rode along for about a mile or so chatting with a lycra clad roadie, we were both waiting on our riding partners to catch up, and you couldnt have met a nicer bloke.

Same with horse riders generally they are pretty friendly, i can't recall a bad word or look from one yet.

nicklouse

it is like anything.

there are wankers out there but you hope not to meet them.

antfly

allthegearnoidea wrote:

were all out for the same thing! and dopnt mind stopping to natter, rather than worrying about average times and speed etc!
got to admit, i make a point of saying a cheery hello to all the walkers and other cyclists i see even Roadies!! although the most i ever get back from them is an acknowledging nod or smile loL!

Well what do you expect,a kiss and a cuddle?

whydoesitalwaysrainonme

projectsome you are lucky to have nice horseriders where you live, i have a cousin who does horse riding and shes perfectly nice to other road users as well.

cat_with_no_tail

antfly wrote:

allthegearnoidea wrote:

were all out for the same thing! and dopnt mind stopping to natter, rather than worrying about average times and speed etc!
got to admit, i make a point of saying a cheery hello to all the walkers and other cyclists i see even Roadies!! although the most i ever get back from them is an acknowledging nod or smile loL!

Well what do you expect,a kiss and a cuddle?

LOL, absolute classic!

To be honest, I think it depends. If I'm on a proper training ride, the most you are likely to get off me is a nod or a smile, mainly cos I'm too busy trying not to die of a heart attack to speak. However, if I'm just out for a Sunday potter about, I am only too happy to stop and have a chat, I actually find that it's a great way to find new trails you maybe were not aware of.

Generally speaking, horse riders round here are ok, smile, nod, whatever. But there are still a couple who insist on riding round the local trail centre ruining the man made bits and leaving horse crap everywhere.

Round here it seems to be mainly the ramblers who get ar5ey with riders. Not so much on the old railways etc, but up in the hills. They seem to have this notion that we have no right being on THEIR hills, and that Mountainbikes are largely responsible for wrecking the paths etc.

I like to point out to them that:

"........Mountain bikes will exert downward force through their tyres, although the "mean ground contact pressure", which comprises the wheel load divided by the contact area (Soane et al. 1981, Smith and thingyson 1990) is likely to be less than that of heavier motorised vehicles, horses and heavily laden hikers. Weaver and Dale (1978) noted that motorcycles had least impact on downhill slopes, due to exerting lesser downward forces than hikers or horses. With the lower wheel loadings of mountain bikes, their impacts upon downhill slopes are likely to be much less than those from motorbikes. This does assume that the wheels continue to turn rather than skidding with hard braking. Such skidding can loosen track surfaces and move material downslope, and most significantly, promote the development of ruts which channel water-flow. The development of such ruts, which can promote erosive water-flows to a greater extent than by foot-step puddling, is the most distinctly unique "wheeling" impact. However, where skidding does not occur, impacts from the normal rolling effects of wheels would likely be less than those of foot steps..........."

The full report can be found here:-

http://www.mountainbike.co.nz/politics/ ... ysical.htm

[smug] 8) [/smug]


EDIT:
It's not the ramblers who are worst, I completely forgot the dog walkers. The ones who either let their dogs run round off the lead to scare the sheep, chase the bikers etc, or have them on such a long lead you can't get past and refuse to reign them in, then look at you like you are Satan himself :evil:

FSR Si

Cat With No Tail wrote:

It's not the ramblers who are worst, I completely forgot the dog walkers. The ones who either let their dogs run round off the lead to scare the sheep, chase the bikers etc, or have them on such a long lead you can't get past and refuse to reign them in, then look at you like you are Satan himself :evil:

Just run over the dog lead then carry on, Maybe next time they'll think twice

cat_with_no_tail

FSR Si wrote:

Cat With No Tail wrote:

It's not the ramblers who are worst, I completely forgot the dog walkers. The ones who either let their dogs run round off the lead to scare the sheep, chase the bikers etc, or have them on such a long lead you can't get past and refuse to reign them in, then look at you like you are Satan himself :evil:

Just run over the dog lead then carry on, Maybe next time they'll think twice

Fixed that for you

KIDDING!

Surf-Matt

I seem to get on with horseriders, ramblers, dog walkers, other MTBers, roadies, etc, etc.

Maybe it's because we own a dog, my wife is a very good horse rider (I used to run/MTB with her when she was riding - huge amounts of fun), we often "ramble" and roadies just seem fine, if a bit odd looking...

If you receive aggro all the time, it's likely you are sending out aggro signals.