By not tackling a problem they’ve been made aware of are they opening themselves up to potential liability?

Not really. Club insurance (assuming your club is affiliated to British Cycling?) is designed to cover the club against third party claims brought by members of the public/invitees. So if the club run knocks someone flying on a pedestrian crossing, that’s covered. If two club mates have a coming together that’s tough luck and one of those things that happens from time to time when riding bikes…
http://www.britishcycling.org.uk/membership/article/memst-Insurance-For-Clubs
BC won’t do member-on-member claims.

Certainly in racing, there’s very little sympathy for fallers. Yes, you have to trust others around you but you also take the responsibility. If this guy is such a menace there are two options:
1) tell him to sod off
2) don’t ride with him (or if you do, make sure you’re as far away from him as possible).
You know he’s a menace yet you were still riding next to him…

I think the only realistic answer is a “gentleman’s agreement” that he at least contributes to a new frame or frame repair but I don’t think you’ve got any way of forcing him to pay up. Trek, for what it’s worth, didn’t have to agree to any discount at all; the fact that they have is pretty decent of them. AFAIK (correct me if I’m wrong), they don’t normally offer a crash replacement scheme.

Sorry if that sounds harsh but I reckon it’s 50:50. The club need to take some responsibility for not taking this guy to task, the rider needs to take responsibility for his actions and bad riding (although if no-one has specifically told him why he’s a problem and how to correct it then he’s probably off the hook) but, given that you knew this guy’s history, I’d suggest you were partly at fault for being that close to him in the first place.

Actually I have always tried to keep away from him but he attached himself to my rear as I passed him; I suppose I could have told him to pish off.

Buy him some rollers for Christmas.

At the time my crash happened it was just the two of us way waiting for the rest of the group to catch up, why he was riding so close I have no idea as we’re usually spread out – if a crash happens in a group it’s hard to say who’s responsible and it could be pretty expensive too!

hmmmm. Only the two of you together, so nobody else saw this ?
Did you tell him you were slowing ?
Did you brake ?

We were alone.

I turned to tell him we’d missed our turning, he looked behind him and crashed into me; I didn’t brake but no doubt I had slowed down in the process of telling him we had gone the wrong way. I didn’t expect him to be that close to me, we were just spinning along.

AFAIK (correct me if I’m wrong), they don’t normally offer a crash replacement scheme.

Yeah, they do. 20% off rrp.

Have you tried punching him in the face?

He’s so rich that his lawyers would destroy me!

The etiqute is pretty simple with this sort of thing. You know the guy’s a liability but still you ride with him ? So you can’t expect him to pay for damages ! Never ever have I heard of that in relation to club/group ride crashes. Really this chap should be asked to move on, if senior members can’t or wont act I’d be moving on myself.

I asked Trek if they could do a crash replacement on an oclv I had. The offer was approx 40% off if I remember right. This was around 2002 mind you. So was it like this back then but now they’ve buckled up or?

So he’s really rich is he! In that case tell him he’s fired I bet it’s Alan Sugar innit.

Have you tried punching him in the face?

Nice.

A hammer on his knees would be far more effective and if he wouldn’t stump up for any damage he caused use it on his head too.
Or maybe take it to the club committee…. 🙄
Groucho Marx springs to mind

To be clear – I haven’t raised this yet with senior members of the club, just with the group leader. The leader is very quick to shout at newbies who cause problems but not his mates! The leader’s response when I spoke to him was that the problem guy was getting better.

It’s annoying as I had been riding with a faster group but had to drop down due to missing some rides due to ill health; I do hope to try again with them in the Spring.

There’s an issue, why would a club have a ‘leader’?. phuck that.

Either stop riding with that group or tell the guy in no uncertain terms you don’t want him riding anywhere effing near you and if he involves you in a crash through his own incompetence he’ll have more than road rash to worry about. Your club does sound a bit pants though, a ride leader shouldn’t be ignoring basic safety just because the guy’s a mate, he’s not fit to lead rides by the sound of it.

I know it’s easy for me to say, but our club would just deal with poor riding directly simple as that.
In our race group it’s dealt with there and then and everyone accepts that.
In the other groups it’s dealt with in other ways, a subtle remark a bit of advice. In the worst case we split each group up on the road until riders get the hang of group riding.
I also remind people not to look down at their bikes or look back whilst in a group.

Why have a ride leader? 15 blokes, 80 miles, new route. One person plans and leads the route. So it’s more common decency to respect that riders lead.

Is it only you that has issues with this guy?

Seems odd if so.

Small claims? It’s a bit unpleasant in a club situation but better than nothing and might make the club committee take his damages more seriously.

Not just me. He took out a guy last winter who received a bloody nose, cracked helmet and torn gilet. The ex president was riding with the group and later said that he should have paid for the damage. He also took out a guy on a climb and broke his wheel but that was deemed OK as the wheel was old. Other than that he went into me another time at a junction but caused no damage and he forced another guy of the road just be moving suddenly towards him. Then there are a few more incidents where he was the only only one involved – couldn’t clip out one time and rode into a grate another.

So not a huge number of incidents but quite a lot for the year and 1/2 he’s been with the club I think.

As for me switching to another club, this ones close to me and others are quite a distance. Also I have a lot of mates there so would be hard to move away from them. Hoping I’ll be strong enough for the faster group soon!

Just spoken to the ex president and he says I should ask him to pay. He’s also going to think about what the best thing to do about his riding – probably talk to the leaders of my group.

Tell me about this guy as I might be able to relate to it.
I’m thinking about a guy in our club, quite strong but proper cack handed. He rides in a medium pace group and his problem is that he can’t stop chatting whilst gesticulating and looking at the rider he is talking to. A couple of examples from one ride.
On a very fast narrow road we always ride single file, not this guy he can’t sit single file for 10 seconds he has to drift out and gabber.
Tight twisty road later on the same ride. chatting again and drifting from near kerb to white lines, then seconds later almost got taken out on a tight bend by an oncomming car and it wasn’t the drivers fault.
Here’s the bizarre bit. His reaction was to swing back in and grab the jersey of the nearest rider WTF!
Some people just can’t get in that zone. When our beginers group and medium group wouldn’t take any advice and would often end up five abreast we resorted to buying a head cam. There were some very coy faces at the club meeting for members and newcomers when it was shown.

Another thing that helps is to get riders to move up, or at least have a go. That can sometimes make people focus.

Actually I have always tried to keep away from him but he attached himself to my rear as I passed him;

therein lies the issue,he has a ‘crush’ on you, fairly serious by the sound of it–

We were alone.

I turned to tell him we’d missed our turning, he looked behind him and crashed into me; I didn’t brake but no doubt I had slowed down in the process of telling him we had gone the wrong way. I didn’t expect him to be that close to me, we were just spinning along.

Absolutely no way would I be allowing someone I knew to be as much of a liability as you describe sit on my wheel in that sort of situation.

Your club sounds bizarre. Ride leaders? Do they wear a special jacket? It isn’t ERC is it? 🙂

I’m not the world’s most experienced road rider, but in a club bunch if someone’s doing something erratic I’m the first to say. Screw worrying about treading on peoples’ toes, I’m not prepared to get injured or have my kit trashed to let someone feel better about themselves. Would expect anyone else to call me out if I did something dangerous just as much.

he should pay for damage caused if it was clearly his fault

the club should do something about his riding, have a word or kick him out

if neither of the above occur, leave the club

Not always easy though – my advice with riders like this is, where possible, keep them well in front so you can keep and eye on them and they can’t slam into you from the side or behind.

the guy also brags about his wealth– needs some taking off him by the sound of it 😉

I turned to tell him we’d missed our turning, he looked behind him and crashed into me; I didn’t brake but no doubt I had slowed down in the process of telling him we had gone the wrong way. I didn’t expect him to be that close to me, we were just spinning along.

you caused the crash.

At the start of the next club run say very loudly “I don’t want you anywhere near me – you’ve already cost me a new frame and refused to cough up.”

Then each time he comes near you, shout loudly “Keep your distance FFS”

Nothing like a bit of embarrassment to bring things to a head.

It does sound like he needs something in his riding, any fool can ride along in a group badly, stretch the distance and the pace and he’ll need to switch on. But you’re not alone, this sort of thing happens in Mickey Mouse road races, anyone that’s fit can have a pop.

To 2tyred. It’s easier to be blunt with people you’ve ridden and raced with, those that have seen you at your best and also seen you when your a broken man. It’s harder to comment on another mans riding when you don’t know them, though on the road it pays NOT to be PC.
As for ride leaders. How on earth does everyone know where they’re going every Sunday every week of the year. Most clubs have a rota. Like now I’m plotting a new route for Sunday. It’s 68 miles and it looks like 18/19 mph average should be doable (for this time of year) I also need to route find on the go so I hope the group will take my lead

I had something similar on Saturday.

Group of 4: One girl had dropped way back so I caught up to the two leaders, said “she’s dropped back, we should pull in here [indicated layby 20m ahead] and wait for her, I pulled ahead of him to repeat the instruction to the girl at the front, meanwhile he’d turned his head to look back for the dropped rider. Next thing I know there’s a massive bang, big jolt and grinding noise at the back of my bike and he’s run into me, got completely tangled up. Incredibly, I stayed upright, he came off, helmet took the impact with a neat crack up the back of it. Took us 5 minutes to untangle the bikes – how DO bikes get that messed up?!

My bike was fine apart from the rear wheel going very slightly out of true, his front wheel was WAY out although just rideable once we’d fully released the brakes, helmet wrecked.

I was mortified and really embarrassed. Amazingly, he still claims full responsibility although I’ve offered (several times) to pay in full. The last time I offered I got an angry text back “It was NOT your fault!!”

I still feel really bad about it but he’s just accepted it as one of those things and said he should have been looking forward until we’d stopped. 😳

We ride with a guy who has zero spatial awareness (mtb) we just continue to tell him he rides like a tool.
It sort of sinks in.

Stabilisers?

Thought I’d post an update to this. No-one in the club seemed interested enough to deal with this so I mailed him to say I think he needs to be more careful when riding – in as friendly a way as I could. No response from that and haven’t spoken since despite being on the same ride sometimes. My bike was replaced by my insurance so that worked out OK.

Had hoped he’d take on my concerns, maybe he did but just heard that he had a bad crash on a club run last week when he hit a curb, no-one else hurt fortunately. Sounds like he’ll be off the bike for a while now.

Karma’s a bitch kerb

Oh another update!

He got back on his bike a couple of weeks ago after having some sort of hip pinning operation after his crash. He rode with the club last week and was happy to be back on the bike. Just heard now that he’s had another bad crash – broken shoulder, collapsed lung, bust teeth. I really feel for him and think some people need to be be aware that maybe club run type rides aren’t for them. I wonder if he’ll give up now, way past other people giving him advice for his own, and others, safety.

I feel sorry for the bloke but he must be a bit of a weapon on a bike to crash so much.

Ouch. Poor guy – sounds like he’s just not suited to road riding. A bit like Alex Zulle (with considerably less doping I expect).

Just heard now that he’s had another bad crash

does he only crash on a club run or all the time.

It does sound like he would have benefited from some basic bike handling training.

I think if it was me then spousal pressure would be suggesting an alternative hobby.

I can understand having incidents in a closely packed bunch, but on a road bike, how do you crash in the first place?
Other than excessive speed or not seeing potholes, really its user error, isn’t it?

I reckon someone in the club loosened his stem bolts.

Poor guy 😳

Some people just won’t learn. Its like when your sat as a passenger in the car and the driver just doesn’t anticipate whats happening around them. They will see brake lights 100m ahead and slam on, pull out in front of people and just generally don’t have a clue how to drive.

Hope the guy recovers but he should have stopped riding a long time ago by the sound of it.

Crashes I’ve had on the road have been losing it in the wet. It doesn’t sound like that’s what’s been happening here. Probably/possibly he just has very poor spatial awareness and isn’t suited to road riding (or driving probably…)

really its user error

I’d like to say no, not always. I crashed last year and broke a collarbone. The cause? A double blow-out in a bend at the bottom of a hill. Excessive speed? Nope, it was a well known road to me and I knew it was a tricky corner so had slowed right down before I initiated the turn. Not enough skill to steer out of trouble? Possibly, but one blow out is enough to contend with, never mind two. I put it down to bad luck, although nearly a year later and I’m still a much more nervous rider than I was before the crash.