coldel

I think learning to cycle helps. A friend on mine who runs a proficiency course gave me a lesson, thought I was a competent cyclist but realised how poor I was. Helped me focus on going from someone who can ride a bike to someone who can ride a bike on a road. Try cycle whilst looking over your shoulder and holding a hand out, bet you swerve a basic skill that many dont have and in fact saw a tour de france groupie do just that in Windsor the other day, nearly killed himself as he swerved across the road into the path of an oncoming Mercedes which fortunately had great brakes If cyclists learnt to cycle, as I think there is certainly more gain to be had from educating the majority of cyclists than the minority of drivers, it would certainly cut down tremendously on the amount of road rage and subsequent car slapping as cyclists would not be stupidly putting themselves into dangerous positions on the road the way they do now.

Thats what bugs me the most, I did a lot of cycling, I didnt jump lights etc - it is possible to cycle without breaking the law.

They do this in London - I've seen a few threads on BikeRadar of people complaining of Police giving them a talking to about it. So some bobbies have the right idea at least And therein lies the problem, cyclists break the law, they get caught, they complain about it. If I jumped some lights in the car, got caught and had a talking to, I would hang my head in shame and just take it on the chin, I am in the wrong. There seems to be a lack of culpability for ones own actions ...

I guess to 'stay on target' with this thread, and not veer towards the theme of many others - we need to change behaviour, cyclists, and I mean the majority here, are breaking the law all too frequently. There needs to be an awareness campaign, along with some level of enforcement of the law. If you were to have say a few traffic police stand by a busy junction, have one watch the junction and radio ahead to a few police the otherside to round up the light jumpers and fine them on the spot, or even confiscate bikes, it would have a massive impact on the flagrant law breaking that we see all the time.

I agree in principle, although you will get the this is the law version which is that its not road tax but vehicle excise duty thus bikes are excluded as are some cars. Roads are maintained through income taxes blah blah.

There is a fee there somewhere, although I would disagree with the first statement, cant imagine people would toss aside their tour de france lycra and carbon fibre bikes because they have to pay a £10 admin fee for an awareness course. Even if as a start it is done purely online. When I did my football coaching you had to do online courses, they were pretty good, showing you examples of behaviour etc I still remember them to this day and the online stuff can easily be sponsered by celebrities to give more impact.

Silver carbon wrap - et voila

We should start up a government petition Cyclists to undergo a one hour awareness training session, as an occasional cyclist and a petrolhead I would do this, so whats your excuse? TV adverts to stigmatise cyclists choosing which laws of the road apply (so similar to the drink drive campaigns). I think anyone using a bike to commute should be covered by some level of insurance as well.

You havent seen Motorway Cops if you think every driver has a license. Most of the people they stop dont have one OK OK so most do and I agree that on the whole drivers are better than cyclists. I do think they should do awareness courses for new drivers (as part of getting the license) for cyclists so they know to look out for them and what to watch for. Yep, especially in London where there are something like 50,000+ cyclists on the road at any one time. Get drivers aware of what you might expect from cyclists. I think though any cyclist buying a new bike must produce a cycle training certificate or similar before they can buy it. Just a certification that they have done some standard 'awareness of the road' training. I still find it incomprehensible that in this day and age you can buy a vehicle and ride it on a road with no training whatsoever. Cyclists at the moment are cycling like they are driving, which is dangerous. Even this morning, as I was pulling out from the side of the road, a car had stopped to let me out, I had my indicator on, the right wheel was turned and out onto the road but a bunch of cyclists having a chat and the front guy looking back over his shoulder to chat didnt see that all the traffic had stopped for me and were waiting, they undertook everyone and it was only me seeing this incident coming stopped and waited until they had passed - I could have pulled out, gotten out in time, but that isnt the point - I saw what was going to happen, the cyclists, had no idea, not a clue, total lack of awareness of the road.

Nice route, I just drove to Munich and back last weekend actually - its a long haul from Calais though (stopped in Baden Baden) must be a good 12 hours once you build in pit stops. The roads are a bit dull until you start to hit southern Germany when it turns totally gorgeous

I didnt mean this to be an anti-cycling post. As a few people have mentioned there are bad drivers and bad cyclists, although in my opinion the bad cyclists as a percentage of all cyclists far outweigh the bad drivers. Why? Probably because to be a cyclist you erm, just need a bike, no training, no licence, no explanation of the laws. Cars, you need to at least pass a test, and as a car driver you need to have a much highly level of responsibility as you know you are in a potentially lethal weapon if used irresponsibly yet I see potentially 'killer' moves by cyclists almost every day where they break the law because they decided it doesn't suit them. My point was more to the fact that cyclists are more and more reverting to this physical interaction and potentially damaging cars. If someone started yanking my wing mirrors back I would have to get out the car, which is not good, there is no guarantee you arent going up against some lunatic, but you just wouldnt let it go, you cant. Licence plates wont work unfortunately. The government wants more people on bikes to cut emmissions, the driver is there purely for revenue purposes. What needs to be done to start with is some awareness raising (like you will see over christmas with drink driving) of bad cycling behaviours and the consequences - it needs addressing, bad drivers are targeted, so should cyclists.

Pulled over this morning to nip into the bakers, porshce cayman s behind me slowed so I could open my door into the road, got out and noticed the rather attractive female passenger eyeing up my car - as it cruised by she smiled at me and waved I just smiled and waved back, no idea who it was

A rather worrying trend I am seeing on the roads at the moment, is the habit of cyclists to bang their fists on cars and cycle off. Saw it again this morning, a Mini turning left into a side road off a main road slightly cut up a cyclist undertaking everyone as his route was suddenly blocked as he turned into the side road. There was no danger to the cyclist, but she seemed to just turn into furious rage and pummelled her fist on the car as she cycled by. Now, no ones perfect, the Mini would never have even been in the way had they not been blocked off on its exit, but I am bemused by people who seem to think its ok to actually physically hit someone elses property, deliberately, because of what was a genuine mistake. Unfortunately just more evidence of the dire state of affairs on UK roads...

Fog was mental 11pm last night, fog all day today as well...end of the world kinda thing!

Already got one, for 80 quid about two weeks back!

What part of SW London out of interest, I lived in Wandsworth and Putney for nigh on ten years...

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/nissan-350z-z33-nismo-style-rear-diffuser-/250934415666

It has a % measurement on the display, even when pulling away and you touch the throttle in normal mode it registers 25% or something, simply because some peoples leaden foot just doesnt have the control to touch and adjust by mm's. I used eco mode for a few days when driving to Brugges and it certainly made a difference.

Yeah could be right, although mine went a funny shade of green Just took em off and sprayed em...then removed them altogether!

Been made redundant twice in the last 18 mths, once because of what you mentioned mate, about them wanting to relocate me (to the USA!) and a downgrade in job status but still on the same money. I turned it down and in effect manufactured my own redundancy, but, I did get a redundancy payout. I found the other company very good though, yes nice suits, but with an element of humanity about it all. I was just up front with them. Second redundancy was when I was at under-performing company, it had to lose 60% of the workforce to stay afloat and me being somewhat a luxury item at the company was on the list. What happened there was that we had new leadership come in and I was straight on the case looking for other work, I had already had a couple of interviews before I even had the chat about redundancy with my current employer. Think you are doing the right thing mate, stay calm, sit down with someone who you trust who is not connected with it and go through your options. Try to put yourself forwards a few months and how you feel about say living in the midlands, or maybe working somewhere else, you will know what you really want to do. Just dont let them dictate to you, take some control yourself now and it makes the problem a bit easier to deal with.

Its odd isnt it, in theory it cannot make the car accelerate quicker, but it certainly feels like it! This is a scan from the instructions which kind of helps understand it...

You are just too quick for me nowadays

For £59 I would not expect too much, it is though an introduction - if you go to their website they have more expensive offers by the looks of it which is more time laden and involves a lot more - £59 doesnt get you much nowadays, but a few laps adrifting a skyline would be worth it I think?

Why?

http://www.groupon.co.uk/deals/london/allstars-driving-academy/1642942?nlp=&CID=UK_CRM_1_0_0_322&a=9