Dirty war waged on cyclists

ANGELA GREGORY talks to Auckland pedallers who have become the victims of wild westies and hoon drivers.

"Wild westies" and teenage hoon drivers are out to get cyclists on Waitakere roads, say the bike-riders.

In just one weekend last month, two cyclists ended up at North Shore Hospital with injuries relating to road rage.

One had a hunting slug pellet, fired by a passing motorist, surgically removed from his backside. The other had gravel extricated from his buttocks after leaping out of the way of a car.

Glenfield cyclist D'arcy Mellsop said he was riding with two friends near Riverhead when a car pulled up alongside him and he saw a man smiling out of the window.

"I felt a crack and thought they had belted me with an apple ... I put my hand on my butt and it was covered in blood. I realised it was something serious."

Mr Mellsop took himself to hospital, and an x-ray revealed the pellet lodged in his backside.

"It was an ordeal. I spent 30 hours in hospital without food while waiting for surgery, then ended up two days there."

Mr Mellsop has decided he will not cycle on West Auckland roads again because of the "hoon levels."

North Shore triathlete Malcolm Meads said two groups were causing problems: teenage larrikins who hooned around, and the aggressive, middle-aged "wild westy person" with road rage.

Mr Meads copped both when cycling at 40 km/h through back roads near Kumeu a fortnight ago.

A truck passed very close to him, and shortly after young hoons did doughnuts (spins) in their car near him.

Then an oncoming car swerved onto his side of the road and drove straight at him.

"It was a deliberate action, even if only to scare me.

"I only just managed to get out of the way."

Mr Meads landed in a ditch, badly bruising his bottom and hips.

"Looking back, I was very lucky not to be another cycling statistic, but I didn't feel very fortunate having gravel scraped from my bottom for two hours at Accident and Emergency, or being unable to sleep for three days afterwards."

The workshop manager of Hedgehog Bikes in New Lynn, Anthony Burrows, said he often heard of cyclists out west having cans and fruit thrown at them.

A senior salesman at Pins Cycles in Kelston, Richard Moyle, said he knew of cyclists in the area who had been knocked off their bikes by cars.

Some of the cyclists had recently started taking down the numberplates of dangerous drivers, he said.

"It's bad everywhere but particularly bad out here. There's not enough awareness of cyclists."

An Auckland cycling club president, Bruce Goldsworthy, said he did not believe cyclists in the eastern and southern parts of Auckland were being targeted by motorists.

"I'd say it's probably just a bunch of hoons out west who pick on cyclists when they can."

Henderson police said they did not get many complaints from cyclists about motorists' behaviour.

Waitakere City Council road safety coordinator Kitch Cuthbert was also unaware of the cyclists' concerns.

But Ms Cuthbert said people generally drove too fast on the narrow and windy roads, and cyclists made themselves very vulnerable.

"It's not a good place for them to go."