A specialty subcategory: my wife and I once went to a party at the house of one of her coworkers, and I noticed some damage on the header board above their garage door. I asked and sure enough - they were in the "used to transport bikes on a car top carrier" cyclist subgroup...

One of the most memorable email subject lines I ever received read:

Garage 1, Bike 0... GAME OVER

My friend had demolished the nice carbon fiber frame of his Trek 2200, despite the "Load Alert" reminder thingy on the hood of his car.

Returning to the main thread topic:

I dated a gal for several years in the early 1980s who was an avid cyclist.  She was of Swedish heritage, and the knitted backs of her bike gloves produced a checkerboard of freckles on the backs of her hands, along with the telltale oval tan spot in the open part of the glove backs.

I'll doubtless end up with the classic cyclist's tan myself this summer; it's not certain whether it will be of the sockless sandal variety, or the stops-just-above-the-ankle sort.  I'm contemplating a neck gaiter as a supplement to SPF ten-zillion sunscreen to try to limit the damage to the nape of my neck.  

In either case, my beautifully-shaved head will be underneath some sort of cover- likely a bandana folded into a triangle and worn similar to a babushka beneath my helmet.  And, if I get around to getting the prescription renewed on my sunglasses, I may also have the inverse-raccoon thing going on around my eyes.

So much to look forward to...

I missed seeing this earlier, but embarrassingly can top this story.  About 20 years ago I crunched one of our Cannondales driving it into our garage, leaving the rail of our Yakima rack bent upwards like a cow horn.  As penance I drove the car around town that way for several months as an act of public self-shaming.

The story ends when I crunch the other Cannondale in exactly the same way, bending the second horn of the rack.  We’ve never been tempted to carry bikes on top of the car since, since clearly I can’t be trusted.  The good news though is that the garage door was fine.

This is exactly why I’ve never carried bikes on top of the car.  I can’t be trusted either. I feel your pain even after 20 years.  There but for fortune go I.

When I used to put bikes on my rooftop carrier I would put the garage door opener in a spot that would remind me the bikes were on the roof, such as in the trunk or under the front passenger seat.   If I had not done that it was only matter of time before I crunched a bike or two.

I too am a member of this elite sub group.  Driving a car which didn't usually have bikes on top, in a rush to drop teenage son at work before heading out on a ride with husband and friends, went roaring up the entry ramp to son's place of work... BANG!

"What's that?" Sez I.

"Mum! The bikes!"

Both bikes hit the hanging barrier (those ones that dangle on chains). The mount for the roof racks failed as no doubt they are meant to do. The bikes, still connected to the bike carriers and the roof racks, pivoted backwards completing 360deg and landed upright behind me. At 7am on a Saturday there was no one behind me for which I'm forever grateful.

The bikes had minor damage. The roof racks were ruined. The car roof had two big divots from the ends of the roof racks as they pivoted. The repair man had seen it all before and insurance covered the lot.

Our friends were witness to my shamefaced confession when I arrived at our meeting place sans bicycles. Bless his little cotton socks the husband immediately borrowed his wife's bike and took my husband off on a boy's debrief ride, thereby preventing a moment of much marital angst.

It all makes a great story now but I'll never forget that moment of realisation after the bang.

I can relate to many of these posts - perhaps unfortunately though, I have never inadvertently stumbled into a nudist colony.  While I used to experience the classic cyclist leg tan, I now tend to wear knee-high compression socks (Bombas are great) so there is even less of my legs to tan.  And I commenced wearing long-sleeve shirts to keep the sun from frying my arms.  I either wear a skull cap with neck drape or a full desert head-face-neck covering to protect the back of my neck, and I am happy to avoid sunburn on my neck.  I got tired of getting sunburned on my fingers from fingerless cycling gloves, so I started slipping a lightweight white cotton glove over them, or sometimes just substituting a full glove (the white leather Hardy work gloves sold at Harbor Freight work great for me) so that the sun doesn't fry my hands.   I have recently become fond of fishing shirts for my jerseys - they are lightweight, have good SPF rating, and many have a lightweight hood to protect your head/neck from the sun.  So I may look a little strange riding with a hood beneath my Nutcase cycle helmet, but I don't get sunburned!   With all this protection suppressing my cyclist-identifying-tan marks I might have trouble being admitted into a cyclist's only bar!

I don't recall ever being teased for it, but the lower tan line seems to be a bit of a secret handshake thing. It's how you know the other person also rides.

I think this "elite sub-group" is comprised of every one who has ever carried bikes on top of a car!

In my case, before tearing my rotator cuff I used to do a lot of kayaking and got used to carrying kayaks on top of the car and stopping at the garage opening to take them off. So, I thought I was pretty much ready to carry bikes up there.

But, you can see the kayaks from the driver's seat since the stick out over the hood and have ropes tied to the front bumper. Bikes are largely invisible up there, but very quickly I broke the seat off a bike when it hit the opening and also damaged the bike tray.

The worst part of that is it denied me the opportunity to occupy the high ground, when on the way to pick me up at work on our way to a biking weekend, my wife decided to stop at the drive through ATM and forgot the bikes were on top...