Viewing 40 posts - 41 through 80 (of 81 total)
  • Commuters have we done this video yet?
  • mrblobby
    Free Member

    Harsh audience.

    The guy does initially seem a bit of a d*ck, but if I had to put up with that day in day out, where the risk is serious injury and not just a pranged car, I suspect my tolerance of other drivers may be diminished somewhat.

    billytinkle
    Free Member

    DezB – Member

    I’d love to know how cyclists could go looking for trouble. I call utter bullshit on that.

    rumbledethumps
    Free Member

    He needs to relax, hes going to have a heart attack. A proper ****.

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    Buzzlightyear
    Free Member

    It’s quite simple dez, over defensive riding, it can and does cause drivers to make stupid overtakes. Yes the drivers shouldn’t do it but if your clever and don’t put them into the position to do it in the first place then your not going looking for it.

    I commute 140miles a week on busy roads between South London to healthrow, so I see plenty of it. I’ve had plenty of close calls, Smart riding, don’t be in a rush and don’t shout at every car that comes within 6ft of you and your enjoy the ride a lot more.

    dazh
    Full Member

    Smart riding, don’t be in a rush and don’t shout at every car that comes within 6ft of you and your enjoy the ride a lot more.

    Exactly the point I was trying to make. My aim for every ride is to get to the end having had no near misses, no arguments, and no reason to shout at anyone.

    And how many of these incidents really do risk injury? In 15 years I can count on one hand the number of near death experiences where I barely got away with it. That’s obviously still too many but 99% of crap driving incidents are easily avoidable with very little effort (like using a brake!).

    DezB
    Free Member

    Nah, that doesn’t explain “looking for trouble”.

    jameso
    Full Member

    We’re all subject to the same roads and drivers, yet some road users seem to find more to get angry about or attract more aggressive reactions than others. They say body language counts for a lot more than we realise – maybe it’s important on the bike too. Choose your attitude, go with the flow etc.

    Johnbot
    Free Member

    He needs to learn when to take a full lane for his safety to avoid some of this shit

    DezB
    Free Member

    That’s it. I’m leaving the helmet, the camera and the bright lights at home tomorrow.
    Obviously, all that’s needed is to ride with a sense of smug superiority and all will be fine.

    brooess
    Free Member

    There’s some appalling driving in that video (or at least the first 3 mins I watched). The real problem is that, pure and simple.

    On the other hand it looks to me like if he rode more primary then a lot of the close overtakes would be impossible and the left hooks, he’d have more space to get away from. That said, I ride primary coming up to and through pinch points and get a hell of a lot of grief for it so it’s something of a no-win that one.

    He really needs to find a way to deal with the general dim-wittery and prejudice of your typical British driver though, for his own enjoyment of riding.

    Overall though you can see why in surveys the main reason people give for not taking up cycling is that it feels too dangerous. This is not a great example of the ‘famous’ British tolerance of minorities.

    The white builders lorry that cuts him up and sticks his brakes on isn’t fit to be in charge of a vehicle, it’s not terribly different from going up to someone in the street and pushing them over just because you don’t like the way they dress…

    davidjey
    Free Member

    OK, having taken the time to watch the whole thing last night, one thing that struck on reflection is the seeming lack of shoulder checks (it’s hard to judge as a lot of the clips are cut so short – in each and every one of them he might have looked over his shoulder half a second before the clip begins)? If I suspect someone’s about to overtake somewhere silly, I’m looking back to (a) check what they are up to and (b) try my best to make eye contact and hope they get the ‘I’ve seen you, you can’t pass me here’ message.

    Anyone I hold up like this gets a wave of acknowledgment/thanks once they are able to overtake me. Sorry if my kowtowing to motorised road users by thanking them for their patience when I have every right to hold them up offends anyone reading this.

    EDIT: I think my new year’s resolution is going to be to stop watching helmet cam commuter footage 😐

    MrWoppit
    Free Member

    Reads to me like you’d probably survive even better if you left your bike at home as well, Dez.

    DezB
    Free Member

    Really? Why’s that? Because I disagree with people who try to say the cyclist’s at fault for the incidents in the video? 🙄

    MrWoppit
    Free Member

    Despite describing advice to “calm down and cycle appropriately to stay safe” as being “smug”, I’m sure you can work it out yourself if you try hard enough.

    HoratioHufnagel
    Free Member

    Anyone I hold up like this gets a wave of acknowledgment/thanks once they are able to overtake me.

    IME, the problem is about 1% of drivers overtake anyway, but now they are even more annoyed that you’ve got in their way.

    You need an almost perfect balance of assertiveness and submissiveness.

    DezB
    Free Member

    “calm down and cycle appropriately to stay safe” as being “smug”

    No mate – it’s the “smug superiority” bit you’ve missed. Read the posts and you’ll understand.

    hexhamstu
    Free Member

    The guy at the end was great. Made it all worthwhile.

    MrWoppit
    Free Member

    Read them. Can’t see it. Just reads like good advice to me, with which I agree.

    liam1974
    Full Member

    What a prat, he wants to calm down and concentrate on riding and not on filming bad driving, reading number plates and getting into arguments its just not worth the bother. I think videos and cyclists like this just help fuel the dislike that some car drivers have for cyclists.
    I cycle to work daily and see bad driving and some terrible cycling.
    We have to take responsibility for ourselves on the road and assume that drivers have not seen us and behave accordingly.

    D0NK
    Full Member

    It’s quite simple dez, over defensive riding, it can and does cause drivers to make stupid overtakes.

    [quote]He needs to learn when to take a full lane for his safety to avoid some of this shit [/quote]

    IME, the problem is about 1% of drivers overtake anyway, but now they are even more annoyed that you’ve got in their way.

    [quote]On the other hand it looks to me like if he rode more primary then a lot of the close overtakes would be impossible and the left hooks,[/quote]Make your minds up people! Is primary right or wrong?

    That’s obviously still too many but 99% of crap driving incidents are easily avoidable with very little effort

    so basically ignore all the shit driving just make sure your reflexes are spot on and you remember to dodge all the cars cutting you up, nice.

    The “Looking for trouble” comments are bullshit. Having gotten pissed off with the amount of shit driving and wanting to catalogue it incase one of those drivers hits someone else, is more likely. Whether this evidence is ever going to be used is debatable (considering the cylingsilk* can’t get the police to take most video evidence seriously) but from what I’ve seen that seems to be the idea behind it along with highlighting the shite that cyclists have to put up with.

    *Barrister who is also a cyclecam-er, obviously he’s always going out looking for trouble 🙄

    DezB
    Free Member

    Well, there you go – I read “I’m better than him” in so many of the posts, you don’t. Such is life.

    D0NK
    Full Member

    Read them. Can’t see it.

    I saw a fair bit I considered to be smug content, but meh, difference of opinion

    Just reads like good advice to me, with which I agree.

    which advice do you agree with?
    “ride in primary you fool”
    or
    “don’t ride in primary you fool”

    oldnpastit
    Full Member

    Cities are slowly working out that they have to make cycling safe. It’s the only sane way to get increasing numbers of commuters into the centre of large conurbations. Bikes use up far less space than cars. Public transport? Don’t get me started.

    I live in Cambridge – if all the people who cycle were to exercise their “right” to drive there would be total gridlock. Not to mention what would happen to car parking.

    Businesses in cities that have good cycle infrastructure will continue to be able to attract more staff, get them to work, grow, and thrive.

    Businesses in cities that don’t manage to figure this out will stagnate – no matter how amazing their shiny new business models, or revolutionary production processes, they won’t be able to get more staff in to work this year than they did last year. These cities will slowly wither and die.

    In a hundred years time our grandchildren will look back at these videos and be amazed at how nasty and unpleasant cycling was in the olden days. In the meantime, we will just have to soldier on.

    (Off to work now by bike past a vast traffic jam caused by closure of the A14).

    allmountainventure
    Free Member

    The real issue on the roads is that its dog eat dog even for car v car, Let alone cyclists and pedestrians. In London you have to drive and ride very very very defensively. General courtesy to anyone anywhere is shocking… its a full on rat race.

    What he is absolutely doing wrong is confronting people like that, and seems on at least one occasion to give someone the finger.. In London that sort of thing has a shelf life, sooner or later he’s going to “disrespect” some nutter and then anything could happen. Potentialy this guy is more at risk of assault than RTA.

    Make the video, share and report… blow that horn as a warning. But for crissake keep calm and ride on.

    MrWoppit
    Free Member

    The “Looking for trouble” comments are bullshit. Having gotten pissed off with the amount of shit driving and wanting to catalogue it incase one of those drivers hits someone else, is more likely.

    Well there you go. I can’t see any driving in this video bad enough to piss any cyclist off that’s not easily coped with.

    Methinks the gentleman doth protest too much.

    stevious
    Full Member

    What’s the deal with the shouting out the reg numbers of the vehicles? Is that so he can report them to the police? Seems like a lot of reports to make if so.

    almightydutch
    Free Member

    Quite surprised after seeing that why the bloke hasn’t had that air horn surgically removed from his own arse.

    I thought using a vehicle horn in an aggressive manner was an offence also?
    I do sympathise with commuters but this individual is just as arrogant and self righteous as most of the drivers of whom he deems ‘Dangerous’

    Buzzlightyear
    Free Member

    “smug superiority”

    You clearly are not reading my posts right, we all share the road with other users, there are bad drivers and bad cyclists. Shouting at people, confronting fueled with rage is not the way to do this. That sort of superiority will get you in trouble some day.

    MrWoppit
    Free Member

    ^^ This.

    D0NK
    Full Member

    I can’t see any driving in this video bad enough to piss any cyclist off that’s not easily coped with.

    He coped with them all, by taking avoiding action, avoiding nobbers who put him at risk, doesn’t mean he has to be happy about it does it.

    I thought using a vehicle horn in an aggressive manner was an offence also?

    AFAIK the horn can be used to make someone aware of danger, I’d consider someone drifting towards me in their car, or starting to cut me up, a danger.
    (just saying, I don’t use an airhorn – or a camera for that matter)

    davidjey
    Free Member

    What he is absolutely doing wrong is confronting people like that, and seems on at least one occasion to give someone the finger.. In London that sort of thing has a shelf life, sooner or later he’s going to “disrespect” some nutter and then anything could happen. Potentialy this guy is more at risk of assault than RTA.

    Spot on. He’s not doing himself any favours by opening each ‘conversation’ with a smug “you’re going to be on youtube later!”

    While there’s some deliberate intimidation in some of the clips, people may not even realise what they’ve done wrong*, so riding up to them and just kicking off is not helpful.

    *obviously it would be helpful if they did, and preferably didn’t do it in the first place…

    deviant
    Free Member

    Anyone I hold up like this gets a wave of acknowledgment/thanks once they are able to overtake me.

    Exactly this.

    Some cyclists need to drop the victim mentality that seems to be prevalent at the moment.

    I ride my bicycle the way i was taught to ride a motorbike, i make eye contact with drivers waiting to pull out at junctions….sometimes i’ll take the initiative and wave the driver out ahead of me, it gives a good impression of cyclists and from a safety point of view that car is now in front of me where i can see it and it wont have to overtake me.

    I’ll raise a hand to thank drivers that leave me plenty of room when overtaking….obviously they are supposed to do this anyway but thats not the point, they dont all drive to the standards laid down in the highway code so some positive reinforcement and a show of my appreciation is hopefully something they’ll remember.

    I do shoulder checks like i’m on my motorbike, if it looks like i’ll get sandwiched between parked cars and cars wanting to overtake me i’ll shoulder check, perhaps signal my intent to take the crown of the road or just slow slightly so the car behind passes me before we get to the parked cars…..its not ‘giving in’ as some people seem to be obsessed with on here, its being safe….i’m sounding like a stuck record but in a car vs bicycle situation who will come off worse?….i want to get home at the end of a ride, not be sat in A&E nursing injuries but content in the knowledge that i had right of way or some other trivial nonsense.

    DezB
    Free Member

    How do you know “he” doesn’t do all those things? All you’ve seen is a microcosm (6 minutes, FFS) of the hours of riding that guy does – moments where he’s been badly cut up and annoyed. The rest of the time I’m sure he’s (almost) as calm and decent a rider as the rest of us…

    D0NK
    Full Member

    Some cyclists need to drop the victim mentality that seems to be prevalent at the moment.

    Too bloody right! Cyclists kill a few (<10) of those ~1800p.a. road deaths and 40% of cyclist/car incidents are not solely the drivers fault. WTF do these cyclists get off thinking they can play the victim card eh? EH?

    MrWoppit
    Free Member

    So, let’s see.

    1: The guy in the video is overreacting to non-problems.

    2: Cycling sensibly with good technique and a “give way” attitude can help avoid accidents.

    3: Cycling with aggression and a sense of over-entitlement can cause more accidents.

    4: Some motorists are inclined to be “cyclist-unaware”.

    That about cover it?

    jambalaya
    Free Member

    So, let’s see.

    1: The guy in the video is overreacting to non-problems.

    2: Cycling sensibly with good technique and a “give way” attitude can help avoid accidents.

    3: Cycling with aggression and a sense of over-entitlement can cause more accidents.

    4: Some motorists are inclined to be “cyclist-unaware”.

    That about cover it?
    bingo !

    So many non-problems there with him constantly speaking out registration numbers. The car that overtook him “fast” left a big gap. Yes there was some relatively bad stuff like being cut up but most was not worthy of being posted. On balance I think the video is bad for cycling safety.

    D0NK
    Full Member

    1. not IMO, camera angles aren’t always great but a few of those driving examples looked well wrong.
    2. maybe, define technique (there’s argument on here about what constitutes good technique) define giveway attitude: slam on the anchors everytime someone looks like pulling out/cutting you up? It’ll reduce accidents for sure but so would cars driving everywhere at 15mph I’d guess not many drivers would be up for that tho.
    3. As a blanket statement yeah probably, not sure it applies to OP video
    4. yeah, significant minority don’t have a clue about how to drive around cyclists, simple ignorance, educating them would be a good idea* and a select few are downright reckless.

    *not really workable at the side of the road tho, adrenaline and near death experiences don’t help cyclists to articulate their point and no driver has ever IME accepted criticism of their driving whilst sat in the driving seat.

    Singlespeed_Shep
    Free Member

    So, let’s see.

    1: The guy in the video is overreacting to non-problems.

    2: Cycling sensibly with good technique and a “give way” attitude can help avoid accidents.

    3: Cycling with aggression and a sense of over-entitlement can cause more accidents.

    4: Some motorists are inclined to be “cyclist-unaware”.

    That about cover it?

    bingo !

    So many non-problems there with him constantly speaking out registration numbers. The car that overtook him “fast” left a big gap. Yes there was some relatively bad stuff like being cut up but most was not worthy of being posted. On balance I think the video is bad for cycling safety.

    +1

    Can’t really see much of it being different if he was in a car.

    billytinkle
    Free Member

    In my opinion video cameras are not good at portraying depth and many of those incidents in the OP would have been enough to increase the heart rate of most experienced cyclists, let alone the less experienced.

    Put it this way – would you want your wife/girlfriend/daughter/mum to be cycling and treated like that?

    The behaviour demonstrated by many of those cars in the video will be enough to put many off riding on the roads at all. It’s bullying pure and simple.

    The reason I believe this chap is getting such a hard time on here is that he simply isn’t likeable. His horn, his tone and his attitude have conspired against him to get a less than favourable opinions even from his own fellow cyclists.

    I watched the video twice, once at work with no sound and later at home with sound. I was much more sympathetic at the first viewing.

    brooess
    Free Member

    The behaviour demonstrated by many of those cars in the video will be enough to put many off riding on the roads at all. It’s bullying pure and simple.

    The reason I believe this chap is getting such a hard time on here is that he simply isn’t likeable

    Stop talking sense! It’s not allowed

Viewing 40 posts - 41 through 80 (of 81 total)

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