Daniel R.

The weather this weekend has been great for riding. Well I could do without the winds from the west but those just make the return trip easier. Yesterday I had a lovely ride out through Concord to Groton and back. Today I did a shorter higher intensity ride along the Minute Man Trail and was off my game on the return trip :( Coming up the hill after 95 there was a long string of riders that I was passing. I could have sworn I was announcing "on the left" but this one women broke the line and almost took me out. I ended up only a couple of inches from the left side. Thankfully no one was hurt but she did have some choice words for me. I stupidly responded over my shoulder that I'd announced but that only antagonized her more. I ended up just riding on trying not to agonize about the situation too much as I'm want to do.

Alas the ride got worse at the end of the trail. At the end I merge back into traffic to make the left hand turn onto Mass Ave. It requires getting across two other lanes of traffic, one turning right, and the other turning going straight. I won't claim it is fully legal, with that said I've made the merge about a hundred times without any issues. Today however after already having one unfortunate situation I got a driver who didn't think I should be there. I was merging as the light was going from green to yellow, so I unfortunately surprised the driver as he was pulling up to be second in line. He honked like mad and for awhile after as I was waiting at the light with him behind me. "Next time I'll hit you" I hear shortly before the light turned green. When it did finally turn green I make a wide turn to make sure I was out of the way. He pulled over and did a hard stop 10 feet after the turn, trying to get me to crash into him. I braked with room to spare and just waited for him to drive off.

Clearly I'm culpable in both situations but hope that there is some understanding that no harm or foul was intended, only what could be construed as a fleeting lack of judgement and etiquette.