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“Hey, Ray!”

09.04.2012 by Ray Niekamp // 5 Comments

Pat and I were out for a short Labor Day ride. The weather was still nice in the morning, with a slight cooling breeze, and lots of cyclists were out and about in our area.

Whenever I encounter cyclists heading in the opposite direction, I give them a wave. Sometimes, they beat me to it. I was doing a lot of waving this morning.

But as two riders passed me heading the other way and I waved, one of them called out, “Hey, Ray!”

Huh? Who was that? I didn’t recognize the jersey. (Ever notice how that’s how you can pick out riders you know — because you know them by their jersey?) It was a black and white jersey. Not familiar to me at all. Of course, that really means nothing. I wear jerseys during the week that never see the weekends, and I’m sure other people have similar jersey-wearing patterns. After all, just a mile later I called back to Pat, “There’s Jerry and Maggie!” I could tell by their matching green jerseys. And their big blue tandem. No mistaking them.

It bothered me though, that I couldn’t recognize the other two guys. And it occurred to me that this kind of thing has been happening more often. Just a couple of weekends ago, I was riding southeast of town by myself when I waved at an oncoming rider. Sure enough, he called “Hey, Ray!” Who was that? Ah, that one I figured out. It was Ralph. He rides with the club occasionally. But by the time I figured out who he was, we were far apart.

I like to think I pay pretty good attention when I’m out riding, but lately it would seem that’s not the case. I mean, if I were paying attention, I would recognize these guys, wouldn’t I? Not necessarily. Mostly, I’m looking straight ahead while I’m riding, and when I wave, I’m not usually looking at the other rider. Maybe I should start. Here’s a new experiment: I’ll eyeball oncoming riders and try to recognize them. That way, maybe I’ll be the guy who’s calling out, “Hey —!”

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Categories // Odds 'n ends, Uncategorized Tags // cyclist

Comments

  1. Ashley Hill (@ashleyhdesign) says

    September 5, 2012 at 4:22 am

    Maybe you’re getting famous and that was one of your readers 🙂

    Reply
    • Bike Noob says

      September 5, 2012 at 5:30 am

      Yeah, that’s it.

      Reply
  2. Steve says

    September 5, 2012 at 9:57 am

    This is clear evidence of either:

    A. Your increasing fame
    B. Your advancing senility
    C. Your declining eyesight

    I think we can all agree that Option A is what we should go with! 🙂

    I don’t have this problem because I don’t know very many local cyclists. I do have the occasional passing car give a friendly honk of recognition. I almost never recognize the car and go days or weeks before the person will mention the encounter!

    Reply
    • Bike Noob says

      September 5, 2012 at 10:26 am

      I’ll go with Option A, but know in my heart it’s a combination of B and C.

      Reply
  3. sensisuperstar says

    September 6, 2012 at 5:23 pm

    Your not alone in this, it happened to me on my first ride on my new road bike, whizzing down a hill a couple of roadies on the ascent waved and one shouted “Hi Paul!” I can honestly say that I’ve never seen the bloke in my life, so either he’s pretty good a guessing strangers names or he knew who I was even though I was disguised in a helmet / sunglasses combo. Anyway I’ve almost given up waving at fellow riders as 9/10 just ignore me, so if you can’t beat them, join them! Keep up the good work.

    Reply

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