A letter from an editor..

Cycling a rapidly growing recreation

I REFER to “First Mat Rempit, now Mat Sikal” (The Star, May 16), which labels those cyclists as Mat Sikal. This is simply not fair to cyclists in general. It could also mislead the public.

I’m not defending the antics of those cyclists featured in the report but they are a miniscule fraction of regular cyclists in this country and, as such, putting a label on them could naturally lead to all cyclists being negatively branded as Mat Sikals.
As it is, cycling is a rapidly growing recreational as well as sports activity in this country. The enthusiasts are made up of Malaysians from almost all walks of life. And they are not of certain ethnic groups.

I regularly go cycling (on and off-road) with school children, university students, low-to-high-income people, professionals, millionaires, pensioners – males and females.

Malays, Chinese, Indians, Eurasians, Orang Asli, tourists and expats all regularly go cycling with my friends and I.

Judging from the photo in the report, those cyclists are commonly referred to as “fixies”– a shortened term for the type of bicycles they ride, fixed-gear bicycles.
Fixed-gear bicycles are rapidly becoming popular in Malaysia due to a handful of reasons, including elements of minimalism plus popularity in the US, Europe and other countries.

In Malaysia, we have one extra reason for its growing popularity. Our athlete, Mohd Azizulhasni Awang is currently the World No. 1 track cyclist!
We can see “fixies” on public roads nowadays. But in spite of that, the majority do not use brakes but rely on their pedals to slow down.

Unlike those cyclists who ride mountain bikes and road bikes on public roads, these “fixies” do not wear helmets, and some of them don’t even use headlights when riding at night. Worse, some of them don’t even have taillights!

It is these “fixies” that give the cycling community and cycling a bad name.
Along with many other cyclists, I often use the public roads to do a bit of workout, train for our next weekend cycling event or simply meet up with other cyclists for a teh tarik session.

No, we don’t race on public roads, let alone illegally organise races.
We don’t want irresponsible, suicidal and inconsiderate people tarnishing the image of cycling. We hope all cyclists (including “fixies”) out there use their common sense and not put cycling in a bad light.

Observe all traffic rules; wear basic safety gear and above all, do not race with each other. We don’t want to be labelled Mat Sikal or anything close to it. We are simply cyclists.

By the way, I find it very hard to believe that those boys in the photo can reach “about 50kph” on their fixed-gear bicycles, unless they were going downhill.
People like Mohd Azizulhasni can do that, but in the velodrome, of course.

AZLAN RAMLI, Shah Alam.

A lot more people are getting irritated about "fixie" degrading cyclist reputation.