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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

The “Cycling Send-Off Woman.” What the hell?

813 replies

4cats4kids · 31/05/2021 16:41

Sorry if this sounds petty, but the most terrible woman came to my house yesterday and I still can’t believe the audacity of her. My husband is in a cycling training team and one of the things they do is meet at 7am on a Sunday morning at a cafe and then they go off out of London on their various routes. This has been going on years and they are basically cycling round the world in stages (as part of a larger group).

So apparently, this weekend was “our turn” to do lunch for this lot - a.k.a “my turn” (but don’t worry, I will not be making a habit of it). I was expecting about 8 who are all men, but this atrocious woman turned up in a sports car before them and was sitting on the drive waiting until they came. I thought she must be something to do with nextdoor (shared driveway), but when they showed up on the bikes she came in with them.

My husband was kind of mouthing, “sorry” to me and they all looked embarrassed. Then he tells me, he’s really sorry, but this is “the cycling send-off woman” Confused and today she has followed them in the car. So basically, I have since found out that this nut job of a woman seems to think she is in the cycling team and turns up at the crack of dawn when they meet and in all weathers, though she never actually cycles with them. Apparently, she always says she will join them one day, but never does. She doesn’t even have the right kind of bike, her bike is apparently more a shopping bike with streamers on the handlebars like a 4 year-old! Once she did cycle with them, but only for about a mile as she couldn’t keep up. She wears really short shorts and brings them all muffins and god knows what apparently at 7am Hmm. DH says they never eat them. Also, she waves pom-poms when they leave. I couldn’t believe it. I asked my husband why he’s never mentioned her before and I said it’s fairly obvious why she’s showing up. He just said they don’t know why she comes and they all think she’s mad. On this day, she had driven to some other cafe where they stop in Surrey because it was a nice day and she fancied the drive. Then she took it upon herself to turn up for lunch because she thinks she’s in the cycling club!

She is like something from Ab Fab and really loud. They were in the garden and there I was, backwards and forwards, while she was going on about how she’s just bought a Zwift, but she can’t seem to get it set up, so could any of them come over to her house and set it up for her (nobody offered and it was very awkward). I also heard her tell my husband (loudly) that she’d really like to bring her son to his boxing club and maybe he could he train them both? It was so very strange. As if! Also, she wasn’t exactly making an effort to talk to me. How rude. I have never come across a woman like this in my life. She is late 40s - who behaves like this?

AIBU to be annoyed that this happened at all? My husband has apologised but seems to think it’s a joke. He doesn’t get it at all. These men are late 40s and collectively, should be able to get rid of this lunatic. He says it’s a public cafe and there’s lots of people there and they can’t really stop her. Well, just find a different place to meet then!

OP posts:
Motnight · 31/05/2021 19:22

This whole thread is nuts. Not least that the Op prepares lunch for a group of other people and doesn't join in herself.

Agree that there is more to this than Op realises. I am in no way saying that this woman is having an affair with Op's husband. But someone has added her to the WhatsApp group for a reason. She can't have added herself.

Iniyat · 31/05/2021 19:23

Lol

BigHeadBertha · 31/05/2021 19:23

This whole thing just has a sleazy feel to it imo. Eight married men have a sexy, single female "cheerleader" and don't mention it to the wife. Personally, that's what I wouldn't put up with.

Fixing the lunch though, hmm. That's one of my specialties in our home just as my husband has his. I'd take it on without being asked and enjoy it too, sorry. I'd find it really weird for anyone to try to weigh in on our chosen division of household labor. Just saying, some of your most famous, most privileged people cook. It's not necessarily a crime or evidence of enslavement, you know.

BigHeadBertha · 31/05/2021 19:25

Oh, wait. Maybe the OP did actually complain about being the one to fix lunch for the guests, sorry.

Gwenhwyfar · 31/05/2021 19:26

"in the worst, you just had the OW power display in front of you."

What? There is no indication that she's the OW is there? She follows the whole group, not just OP's DH. That's not something her DH can lie about is is, because the other members of the club would be able to confirm or deny it?

Inertia · 31/05/2021 19:27

It’s rather naive to think that mistresses never turn up to the cheating husband’s family home. Plenty of them do it in a kind of territory-marking fashion- requiring the wife to be servile wouldn’t be a new thing either.

I don’t buy a story that outlandish never being mentioned until the day the woman turns up. In my experience, MAMILS will tell their wives every interminable bike and cycling club- related detail- there’s no way a muffin-laden groupie is kept under the radar accidentally.

Gwenhwyfar · 31/05/2021 19:28

" Eight married men have a sexy, single female "cheerleader" and don't mention it to the wife. Personally, that's what I wouldn't put up with.

Is she that sexy?
There's a woman who follows the cycling club because she likes to be around the men. So what?

vivainsomnia · 31/05/2021 19:28

I think deep inside it is very much unerving you that your OH hasn't never mentioned her because unless he never ever talks about this cycling group and what they do, even snapshots of it, he had reasons not to mention her. My OH without a doubt would have done so.

There is more to it than what he tells you. Not having an affair, but not someone who also just happens to be there uninvited and cumbersome. You know that and that's why you are being quite nasty about her.

AntiSocialDistancer · 31/05/2021 19:28

@funnylittlefloozie

There ARE women like this, though. My exH was heavily involved with a professional rugby team, and there were lots of slightly sad women like this. They really, really want to bag a player, but aren't the type, so spend the rest of eternity trying to bag a wealthy supporter. I think this woman is probably the amateur cycling equivalent.
Thats professional though. If this is Wiggins' cycling team I'd understand it, although I would expect them not to pander to it.
Merchymor · 31/05/2021 19:29

@BigHeadBertha

Oh, wait. Maybe the OP did actually complain about being the one to fix lunch for the guests, sorry.
Yep, the complaining was the thing. My BIL always caters for family groups at his house because he loves it (his father was a chef)..
Gwenhwyfar · 31/05/2021 19:29

"It’s rather naive to think that mistresses never turn up to the cheating husband’s family home. Plenty of them do it in a kind of territory-marking fashion- requiring the wife to be servile wouldn’t be a new thing either."

Sure, but what is there to suggest that this woman is her DH's mistress if she goes to all the cycling things, assuming that's true as we have no reason to think it's not.

Blankspace101 · 31/05/2021 19:30

There is more going on with her and these men than meets the eye. If it was a man that showed up each week to cheer them on in short shorts waving his pom poms they would have easily found a way to ditch him him.

4cats4kids · 31/05/2021 19:31

I don’t feel like I had the OW paraded in front of me. It’s really not that. It’s more that I found the whole thing weird. I mean, if you like a particular man or men or you want to meet someone, I guess a cycling club may be as good a place as anywhere. But just wait for one of them to ask you out for dinner or something? Don’t follow them as a group around the lanes of Box Hill or wherever. And the whole “Oh could one if you pop over to help get my Zwift set up..,” Christ on a bike! Grin

I don’t know what her car was but it was a small two-seater one and pale blue.

OP posts:
BigHeadBertha · 31/05/2021 19:33

Please keep us posted, OP.

NoddyMcPintsAlot · 31/05/2021 19:34

DP is in a similar cycle group and I’m kissing myself laughing and the vision of a mad as a Box of frogs woman giving them a pom pom send off.

I wouldn’t be entertaining the lunch every few weeks.

rattlemehearties · 31/05/2021 19:38

Have read the whole thread and I still can't understand OP why you let her join in for lunch? In your own house/garden?

StillCoughingandLaughing · 31/05/2021 19:38

@PegasusReturns

Someone gave her your address.

I’d want to know which of the 8 it was Hmm

I find comments like this bizarre. OP has made it clear more than once that this woman is on the WhatsApp group. Is it really that incongruous an idea that someone, out of eight people, said on that chat ‘Remind me of your address’?

Thanks to the combination of lockdown and no garden, I haven’t had visitors in nearly 18 months. Even my best friends, while having an idea of the right road and being able to recognise the house, probably couldn’t reel off the address from memory. Hell, my parents moved house two years ago and sometimes I even have to check the Royal Mail website for their postcode.

GrimDamnFanjo · 31/05/2021 19:38

There must be more to this...
I'd be checking in with the other wives. Have they turned up to their houses?

dodobookends · 31/05/2021 19:39

she didn't just overhear the address though, she got there first

That's because they are cycling... and she is in a sports car.

Shehasadiamondinthesky · 31/05/2021 19:41

I would have thrown her out of my house head first. But then I don't stand for weird crap like this.

BigHeadBertha · 31/05/2021 19:41

@rattlemehearties

Have read the whole thread and I still can't understand OP why you let her join in for lunch? In your own house/garden?
If I understood it correctly, the OP was caught off guard. The woman slipped in along with the men and the OP didn't know what was going on.
NoddyMcPintsAlot · 31/05/2021 19:43

Pissing myself, !

BigHeadBertha · 31/05/2021 19:44

@Gwenhwyfar

" Eight married men have a sexy, single female "cheerleader" and don't mention it to the wife. Personally, that's what I wouldn't put up with.

Is she that sexy?
There's a woman who follows the cycling club because she likes to be around the men. So what?

Pom pom woman... Is it you?
Looubylou · 31/05/2021 19:45

I think they are just flattered. I can imagine them being too nice to get rid. It is really strange she hasn't been mentioned though - unless DH knows OP has form for either taking the P or being suspicious.

CandyLeBonBon · 31/05/2021 19:45

How awkward op. There's no need for Pom-poms on a Sunday. I do hope you recover.

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