Wagglers rule!

[NomoneyNohoney]

There is no real point to this post,except that I want to express something that is important to me.
I love it when a biker lifts his foot to show appreciation of a kind gesture.

Today, I was hammering along and saw a bike closing up on me. Once I'd decided it almost certainly wasn't a police bike, as a gap appeared in the middle lane, I indicated left and then when I reached the gap, drifted out of the outside lane. As I was doing this, the biker had seen my plan, accelerated and then caught up to me as I went into the gap. It only took a few seconds, then he was smoothly past me, I indicated right and pulled back into the original lane, tailing the bike at the original unchanged speed. Then came the foot waggle, and I just want to share with you , how much such a simple gesture means to me. It's nice to be casually appreciated,especially for such a manoeuver where we both knew the plan instantly.

That's all. Just wanted to share that with you. Wagglers rule!

[bungeejumper]

Funny, I rode bikes for sixteen years and I was never aware of the foot waggle. It probably hadn't been invented then - and to be honest, I'm not absolutely sure that I'd notice it now. Certainly not while driving in and out of traffic gaps at speed. Is it intentionally subtle? Like a masonic handshake?

I do remember getting beaten up by car drivers, though - metaphorically speaking, of course. The cortina cowboys who would do anything they could to race you on your bike, or who would deliberately close up on you when you were passing a line of cars and trying to get back into lane on the right (i.e. left) side of the road. (V dangerous.) Or the lorry drivers who would would drop lighted cigarettes into the laps of any motorcyclists who sat alongside them at the traffic lights.

For some reason, I was reminded the other day of the advice given to learner motorcyclists back in a 1950s instruction booklet. (My own biking years began in 1967.) "It is a hallmark of a good motorcyclist that he should be so unobtrusive on the roads that he becomes practically invisible."

Hah, that one didn't last. And a good thing too.

BJ

[DrFfybes]

Seems to be a (slightly) more recent thing over here.

It used to always be a nod or a wave, mainly to other bikers, but on the Continent they were doing foot waggles in the 1990s. Makes sense, you don't need to let go of a handlebar to acknowledge someone, which is a good idea when filtering.

Paul

[airbus330]

Yes, the foot waggle was always that strange thing other bikers did on the continent, particularly in France. I thank the OP for their appreciation of a waggle or wave of thanks as we filter through traffic, I always thought it was the right thing to do, if not always the easiest thing to do while avoiding the next cars mirror!