RTFA: http://blog.wired.com/cars/2008/05/in-a-city-built…

“There’s thousands of cars and you’re just flying by,” said one of the group, called RichToTheIE, by phone on Wednesday. “It’s an amazing feeling.”

The renegade rides are a radical off-shoot of the popular - and often controversial - Critical Mass rides held each month in cities around the world as cyclists grow increasingly vocal in asserting their rights to the road and extolling the environmental and societal benefits of ditching your car in favor of a bike.

Such rides are usually limited to downtown areas, but Crimanimalz are taking them to the freeways of Los Angeles to prove that riding a bike is faster than creeping through bumper-to-bumper traffic.

I love this idea! We all saw it in the intro of Office Space, where the protagonist races an old man with a walker… and loses due to the traffic. Switching lanes repeatedly only seems to make things worse.

Coming out of the Bay Area, I can vouch for this kind of traffic… and at the same time, I can vouch for the amazing time savings of bike travel. So, I totally love this stuff:

The thing is, I totally believe it when they say they’re biking faster than freeway traffic. …and local gas prices hit $4.35 (for the expensive stuff). I can only imagine the arguments for justifying the status quo, but let’s face it: a good idea is a good idea, and one that saves you money and time is a fucking fantastic idea.

Get a bike with smooth tires, a helmet, a good lock, and a bike pump. This will cost less than a tank of gasoline.