Riding defensively pays off!! Last night I was inches from going over a mondeos bonnet as he was side on to me.

Motorcycling
1

2-10pm shift last night.

Wasnt too bad a shift, had a laugh. Educated a youth the error of his ways, went to a community meeting or two.

Coming home, after 10pm, Honeypot Lane from Wembley area towards Stanmore, coming to the lights having come down the dual carriageway past the speed cameras and scottals stanmore BMW.

On your left before the lights are a set of shops. A car turns left to the shops, im on lane two of the dual carriageway.

I saw a mondeo exiting from the shops sliproad to enter the dual carriageway, head straight across our two lanes to enter the middle island intending to go the opposite carriageway back towards Wembley in the opposite direction.

I had this feeling about the mondeo driver. The car on my left was indicating, slowing in lane 1 to turn into the shops.

In lane 2, I was slightly obscured by the turning car to the driver pulling across our lanes in the dual carriageway.

HOWEVER. IF YOU WERE TO BE LOOKING PROPERLY, I could see the eyes of hte Mondeo driver through the glass of hte car turning left from lane 1.

I could see that he was looking to his left and not his right, he anticipated the slowing car to turn left and of course he began to pull out across my lane, at this point I was coming from a 40 into a 30. Just came off the gas as I felt I hadnt been seen. He pulled right out covering off lane 2, and I had my first real time emergency brake and stopped seconds from impact in line with his drivers side of his front bonnet and front wheels. The whole camber of hte bike had lurched right forward. He just looked at me in shock and gave a half attempted apologetic wave and stalled his car.

I was fuming, but had anticipated him well!! I proceeded to tell him to also make sure he put his seat belt on as he left to further ridicule him.

I then tried to ride off, but in my shock, i hadnt changed gears and stalled…ha ha

2

Looks like you did exactly the right thing. Glad you did and there was no contact.

Hopefully the driver will have learnt from this and will use his eyes in future :ermm:

3

Good observation there mate, glad it had a relatively happy ending !

4

Very good obs and forward planning. Glad you handled that well.

5

u done well to avoid a bad situation there.if u hadent been on the ball as much it could have been real nasty.

6

Well done,

Sometimes you do get a “feeling” about a driver and then they do something stupid.

I’ve had that before. I was in the right hand lane on a roundabout where there’s three lanes going on and three lanes going off, so pretty much you can be in any lane to go straight on, and people do all the time. While I was next to the car on my left at the lights I suddenly had a feeling he’d turn right. Not sure why, perhaps I subconciously saw him looking at me or something, but it was nothing I could put my finger on. Lights change and sure enough car drive dives across my lane to go right round the roundabout. I had to brake hard, but if I’d been accelerating faster like I might have been had I not been anticipating it I would have hit him.

7

Good observation, it’s what it’s all about when you are riding in town.

I can very often predict that cars in front of me are going to turn right, they start to drift over towards the middle of the road way before they start to indicate (if they even bother).

I also make a deliberate sideways move, moving across the lanes, as I approach a driver emerging from a side junction, somehow I’m convinced it helps them see you better and gauge your approaching speed.

8

Bet ya never had a black visor on;):cool:

9

No

Havent got one. Want to lend me one? (Black visor)

Believe it!

Today outside work I witnessed a Ro Mail van turn right from a give way minor road onto major, crossing the path of a courier on a CG 125 that he didnt see!

The rider on the CG125 beeped his horn, as he had the right of way on the main road., The driver in the van came to a stop and froze. The biker almost got round swerving, but slammed into the front bonnet, spun out and the bike fell to the right landing on his right leg. Bruising only…

One company van driver im afraid, now being considered for dr w/o due care and attention.

10

I find it very hard to trust any car over another (truck, van, car, taxi or bicycle) and I tend to try to ride like no-one ever sees me anyway. The point about taking clues when a car moves even slightly within it’s lane is I think really important. I’m starting to lose count of these moments!A similar thing happened to me with a cyclist on Sunday - I was doing about 30 and (in hindsight) I think I must have seen his right shoulder drop a little, and I braked hard. He then turned right into the middle of the lane without looking. The guy absolutely shat himself when he saw me just rocking back at a full stop immediately to his right hand side. Scared the hell out of me too. He gave a feeble “oh sorry…” - I flicked up my visor and glared at him for a few seconds but couldn’t find any words.

I think we’re pre-programmed to have some intuition about these things and for us on bikes, we develop that sense to quite an unusual level - I’m not sure it’s even a conscious process.

Nice work on the defensive riding - and your desription of it!