Be Careful out there!
 

"Be careful out there"?

The cited incident is an extraordinarily rare sort of event, and I can think of no way to protect myself from it other than not ever riding my bike.

What the hell was the motive for doing that?

I live in a rural area, so probably would never encounter something like this,

Don't see how being careful would have avoided this. Bear spray might have been useful.

If you see a guy coming out on the road, swinging a big metal pipe at you, it might be easier to just ride around him. Or turn around.

Not that it's very likely that a guy will ever swing a bit metal pipe at you while you are riding your bike.

Where I ride, there would be no room to ride around him. Turn around, maybe. I doubt I will ever meet a guy with a pipe but other encounters could develop of even a more serious nature, and calling 911 is not going to do much good.

Did you watch the video? The pipe guy was in the middle of a bike path, not coming out on a road. Hopefully this is an isolated incident but it did happen so we aren’t speculating about hypotheticals.

Google "assaults on bike trails". They are not "extraordinarily rare"; so yes, be careful out there.

Walkers and bikers don't mix, I'd stay off the paths and on the road then you just have to deal with crazy drivers. I usually load my bike in the car and drive to a remote place so I don't have to deal with either,it's worth the effort.

riding 20mph on a path shared by walkers and hikers is asking for trouble

While true mixing modes of any kind in any environment has risks... It may be worth noting walkers & hikers not following the rules is also asking for trouble.

What's so hard about: All trail users must keep to the right? Or: All dogs must be kept on leash?

Personal exceptionalism at it's finest.

What does this guy do when hes driving a vehicle and encounters a rider?

You're demonstrating a remarkable lack of ability at calculating comparative risks. On a road, you have to deal with crazy drivers AND the risk of insane people with pipes.

He's clearly mentally ill. I wouldn't assume we really know whether he intended to assault a cyclist or if that just happened to be the first person he encountered.

Either that or 'roid rage. He's definitely not firing on all cylinders. Hope there was an order for a mental health exam along with the assault charge. These type of deliberate acts and the potential for menace are one of the reasons that until moving to New Zealand I rode strapped. This type of stuff happens to cyclists more than one would think. As a long time urban commuter I encountered several dicey situations. So, yeah be careful.out there.

Situational awareness! I would have sussed that freak before I ever got close. I'm not blaming you, I'm just super-tuned to the weirdos of the world. They stand out to me like they have flashing lights.

Yep. Pretty much every incident I've witnessed has been the result of selfish pedestrians.

We're all very impressed by your 20/20 hindsight.

?

How does my foresight become hindsight? Way to miss the point of "situational awareness" LOL! Typical for this forum.

Because you aren't exhibiting foresight, you're claiming you would have had it in hindsight.

What's typical of this forum is your "this couldn't happen to me because..." nonsense. You have no reason to believe you have any more situational awareness than the rider in the video or anyone else for that matter. That was an ambush and it's damn silly to claim that anyone would likely anticipate it. Despite your vapid disclaimer, there's a very obvious implied victim blaming in your post.

^^^^^ "...victim blaming..." Is that like fat shaming, toxic masculinity, **** shaming, identity politics, TDS, intersexuality, manslaining, womansplaiining or countless other hipster buzzwords or phrases having entered contemporary vernacular in the last ten years? There are so many I begin to get salty tryna keep up.

just ride at night, there are never any weirdos out at night, except he guy who creeped out of the trailer park with a pipe bomb and scared the crap out of me,