Yeah, an awful lot of drivers seem to forget that¹ I have the right to the entire lane, even as a cyclist. If you don't like it, you can use the other lane, if there is one, to go around me. If there isn't — tough! Am if I am occupying the entire lane, there is almost certainly a reason for it — like an upcoming left or because there isn't sufficient room for you to pass. Because if there weren't, fighting with a car is not high on my list of priorities: I'd much rather scootch over, give you room to get by so you can speed of into the sunset and I can have an empty road to myself.

¹IANAL; in the jurisdiction I'm in, but my understanding is that this is common

That's definitely the law here in the UK, although FWIW most of the time I don't feel the need to occupy the whole lane. Cars generally pass reasonably safely here, plus there generally isn't another lane on the kind of road I'd be cycling on.

> although FWIW most of the time I don't feel the need to occupy the whole lane.

Yeah, I perhaps should have made it clear that occupying a full lane is something I do probably <2% of the time. Not very often, and for similar reasons to the rest of the comment: I don't really want to have to deal with cars, and if I can stay right and let them by, I will.

I'm in America, so it depends on the road; where we have unprotected bike lanes, then I'm in that & there's passing room, but too often there are "sharrows" where there really isn't a good deal of room for passing. Then it's very situational. (Usually the car taking up part of an oncoming lane as they pass.)

In the UK you're not only allowed to take the whole lane, the Department for Transport (through Bikeability) calls this the primary road position for cyclists. The guidance is that this should be the default, with the secondary position (~1m to the left) only used when the road is wide and the rider is certain that keeping to the left wouldn't compromise their safety.

https://www.britishcycling.org.uk/cycletraining/article/ct20...

I go into roundabouts while occupying a full lane, unless I use the first exit/turn left.

Yeah. I was on my eskate on a 4-lane road recently, riding 1m out from the curb due to gravel and debris (killer for those tiny wheels), and I had a car honking at me to get out of the way even when there was a whole other lane to change into!

He eventually did a half lane change, buzzing me as he went by, then got stuck at the next red light while I caught up. Ridiculous.

My area has the opposite problem: motorists offering to let cyclists go when they have the right of way. It's generous of them to make such an offer, but they don't seem to realize that the safest thing for a cyclist to do is follow the same rules as motorists when they are cycling in traffic.

(Of course my area also has reckless motorists who don't respect the rules of the road, but they seem to believe they are above the law whether they are interacting with cyclists or other motorists.)

This also drives me crazy, it’s nice of them but ends up complicating an already tricky turn or crossing or something else. The worst is when they do it in a situation where there’s more than one lane and I literally can’t see or expect cars in the other lane to also stop / slow down for me.

Any good strategies for these types of encounters (esp. when visibility is poor), other than thanking them but insistently waving them on?

On left turns, I do a shoulder check right as the light turns green. People seem to be less inclined to wave cyclists through and less inclined to hesitate thinking the cyclist is going to dart through if the cyclist isn't looking in their direction.

> other than thanking them but insistently waving them on?

Unfortunately not, that's basically my strategy.