Yesterday i finally whip up the courage to try commuting with bike, i planned the 40km round trip to visit my mom and go grocery shopping on the way back, planned the route with as much residential street as possible, and that was a fun experience! While there’s a lot of “woah, ebike”(where i live a proper ebike is rare, even though mine is converted) and “you travel from that small town? That’s insane!” from stranger, what’s not fun is the ride on some stretch of the road.
I live in a small town outside the city, a lot of the road going out of the town is pretty much 1 lane each way, no cycling facility for the whole country(Malaysia), the road shoulder is narrow to non-existent(the line is basically bordering between road and grass/dirt) if not filled with potholes/cracks/sketchy road maintenance/bump made by tree root, and motorist often driving very fast even on narrow road. Luckily more often than not they does give me a lot of space when they’re passing(thanks to motorcycle culture), but those who don’t is very discouraging for the whole experience, mostly it’s the one riding moped that pass me too close for comfort with 30/50kmph faster than me(no thanks to motorcycle culture).
I planned to do it often, first by doing a no-car sunday, then slowly switch to commuting to work(also 40km round trip), and eventually cut down car use to only just a day or two a week or only on long distance travel, but this experience kinda made me second guess the whole plan. It’s also quite tiring, i can still feel the fatigue today.
So how did you guys that do the commute able to keep going? Any advice on that end?
On the fatigue part. (Jokingly) It will not get better, you just get faster. With that out of my system, it will get easier and soon you will find yourself more energetic. Because extra training.
When it comes to safety you are going at it the right way. You look for back roads, slower roads, residental roads etc when there aren’t cycling infrastructure. But uf it is unsafe I would think twice/thrice if it is worth the risk. Luckily it sounds motorists are already used to safely overtaking slower two-wheeled vehicles.
Depending on your cycling community you can have great use of cycling/outdoor apps with heatmaps. Then you can see where others are travelling. Strava, Ride with GPS and Komoot are useful for me locally. Especially strava with the large community.
Motorcycle culture is kinda huge in Malaysia, there’s like 47% of car vs 46% of motorcycle/moped on the road at the end of last year, so majority of people tend to know how to overtake, and police tend to side with smaller transport whenever road accident happened. There’s a good and bad in that but that’s for another time lol.
I ride my ebike to work and I worry about getting hit by a car a lot. The more miles ridden, the more the probability that an accident will happen. I try to take steps to reduce the risk: stick to back-roads with less traffic as much as possible, use trails and protected bike lanes when available and ride defensively. I am lucky that I have a route that keeps me off the main roads and on trails/protected bike lanes for almost all of my trip. It was hard to come up with this route and it makes what should be a 10 mi ride into a 14 mi ride. That said, I can do it in an hour on my ebike. If the ride was much longer or I had to ride on busy main roads, I would not do it.
Be safe!
Thanks for the advice! Yeah going off the main road is the safest, but my first few km have no alternative path to take, only main road :/
Guess i have to brave through it and be as defensive as posssible
All of what the other two commenter’s said + the following:
- wear a helmet (kind of obvious, but depending on the culture people frown on road safety for cyclists)
- wear a high vis shirt
- put a back mirror on your handle that sticks 20cm or so.
The last one makes the difference in Munich between riding my normal bike and my ebike. With the mirror you see them coming, making it less uncomfortable when they pass + they automatically keep some more distance as they don’t want to hit the mirror.
Finally, depending on how fast your bike goes, look into tuning it to higher speeds? Mine is an s-pedelec and goes 45km/h, that means in city traffic I am able to swim with the traffic and not get passed often (this will probably trigger some debate and is a suggestion you should think about carefully, as it has other implications)
Ooo that mirror trick might be handy.
Also unfortunately(or fortunately), we can only have class 1 ebike legally on the street, but i guess it kinda makes sense because at that speed it’s better to get a moped
On the topic of fatigue: They to eat enough. It sounds silly, but you burn quite some calories while riding a bike and you will need to fuel yourself. Have something with carbs after the ride or even a snack during. You will also get used to it more and more over time. The first rides are always the hardest.
And it might really not be possible in the place where you live, but prefer smaller paths/roads over the main roads. It might add a couple of km to your ride but you will reach your destination much more relaxed.
Wish you all the best.
Thanks! i think i’ve figured out my fatigue, it’s a hot, sunny afternoon and i didn’t drink much water during and after the trip, and didn’t eat much the morning before the commute as well. I ride for about 45minute every other day unassisted and i don’t feel that awful afterward so this might explain it i guess.
40 km is quite a lot of you’re not used to cycling such distances, even with an e-bike. I’d suggest taking it easy and starting with shorter distances. As for traffic, there’s not much you can do about that other than choose your routes carefully. If you can’t ride safely to some destination, it’s better to take a car than to risk your life. That’s unfortunate but safety should always be the number one priority.
In the US, many states have a law specifying a minimum passing distance when passing a bike and it is normally 3 ft (about 1M). I have seen some cyclists cut a very bright piece of foam (usually a pool noodle) and attach it to the back of their bike sticking out into traffic. This creates a visual barrier to encourage people to give more room when passing. I don’t know how the laws or culture are in Malaysia, but maybe something like that would help.
Here’s an example (from Canada): https://www.ctvnews.ca/canada/cyclists-in-toronto-riding-with-pool-noodles-to-protect-themselves-from-drivers-1.4082620
Full time commuting is pretty dangerous. I’ve been riding bikes for years, and all of the issues I’ve run into over the years almost all came on commutes.
I just treat it as a special treat every now and then. If you do it everyday it gets old pretty quickly. I mean if you have a nice commute then maybe it’s OK. I used to commute into downtown in a city where the war of Bikes vs Cars was very much alive though, and I just decided ultimately it wasn’t worth it. I mostly just ride outside of times when everyone is overfilled with rage, and it’s more enjoyable. Sucks it has to be that way :/
Can confirm, I had a bike path the entire way and it was awesome. I tried going on the road to cut the ride a little shorter, and that got old fast.
Yeah it’s kinda sucks bike got pushed away in favour of car, even in short distance commute. :/
You know what really sucks though about the bikes and commuting? Its not even the drivers or the infrastructure, it’s the damn theft. They gotta get that figured out. I’d have one of those cargo bikes in a heartbeat, as our driving is 95% just daycare and back and/or groceries. But the theft in our city is insane, I can’t even run into the grocery store without a not-insignificant chance the things not there when I come out.
Our city is struggling with the opiod crisis (like many other cities), and the stolen bike trade seems to be one of the many primary sources of funds for that sort of thing. You’ll see homeless people downtown riding on super expensive mountain bikes, I saw a guy wacked out of his mind on a Pivot Firebird once. Clearly stolen, but the cops just allocate token resources to it, while people walk around openly downtown with battery powered die grinders. I watched a guy a few years ago go through one of those New York kryptonite locks like it was a bar of butter, before I could even act on it (plus I was in a skyscraper a few blocks up). We called it in, but I mean buddy was probably back at his encampment before that call even reached a cruiser.
So I’ve got a rule with my bikes (I’ve got a high end eMtb and a fairly high end road bike), if it’s not in my line of sight or I’m not on it, then it’s not outside. I had a job a few years ago that allowed me to bring it into my office, but my last job that wasn’t possible. I work from home now, so it’s moot, but I just don’t trust leaving it anywhere, which rules out most in-city bike use. Big problem.
So how did you guys that do the commute able to keep going? Any advice on that end?
I rode further every time I went out, and it eventually got easy to get to distances that were previously “impossible” without stopping for a break. My first ride after not being on a bike for maybe 20 years was only a few KM, and that was incredibly difficult! Less than a month later, I was up to 100km. Last weekend, I rode 200km, came home, walked several more KM to pick up ingredients for dinner, came home, made dinner, and did 80 km the next day. LOL You just get more fit with time and riding.
I will say, though, that at a certain distance, you will want to consider a food/water strategy. I know that I can generally ride for about two hours without needing to snack, or even sip from my water bottle. But for hours on the saddle, I prepare with snack bars and water. I still suck when it comes to eating enough on really long rides, but that’s more about training my stomach to get used to eating constantly (which I don’t do off the bike).
Also, at longer distances, you’ll want to consider making your bike as comfortable as possible. Make sure your saddle is the right height, that your handlebars are setup correctly, that your posture is good, etc.
Good luck!
