Bike riders are retaking the streets and the motoring lobby are really not happy. It’s making national news.

Whoever sang the revolution will not be televised was wrong – it was the subject of the BBC’s Inside Out programme last week. One anti-cycling petitioner even threatened ‘civil disorder’, that’s how far things have deteriorated in the flash points in the south.

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All this in the same week that a new report predicts that half of the UK population will be obese within 36 years. Isn’t it time that overweight drivers got out from behind the wheel and joined us on two wheels before it’s too late for them?

How can anyone claim there is a ‘cycling threat’ when a quarter of adults in England are obese and a further 41 per cent of men are overweight? We’re the solution, not the problem.

This Sunday was no exception. There was no shortage of fatties in four-by-fours shouting abuse at this lone cyclist for slowing them down. I get increasingly frustrated at being called a loser for exercising by the overweight occupants of cars. They really should be joining me, not abusing me.

Maybe it’s a guilt thing. Too many motorists know they should be exercising and every cyclist they see is a reminder that they are neglecting their health.

Robert Garbutt is editor of Cycling Weekly