Dangerous motorists (On or Off Road) - your rants!

KonaKurt
KonaKurt Posts: 720
edited June 2009 in MTB general
Sorry to post something so negative, but I think it's time for some rants and stories about bad motorists. Whether on or off road (maybe a 4x4 ?), let off some steam with your rants amd adventures here..!

I'll go first...!

A big thank you to the stupid grey haired plum in his black Range Rover (registration PSU ???) who drove down from Shotover Hill (Oxford) down along Old Road this afternoon. Thank you for not only pulling out from a private driveway somewhere, very suddenly without checking if a cyclist was coming down the hill at a sensable 20ish MPH... but thank you also for looking at me in your mirror over and over again, and deliberatly hitting your brakes suddenly again and again ....

It's quite obvious to me that you don't like cyclists from the way that you kept checking to see if you could make me rear end your tail bar while going downhill. I wish I had my helmet-cam turned on, because your dangerous driving today, not to mention your nerve at provoking a cyclist for no obvious reason, deserves to have your license suspended and a hefty fine.

A good job I decided to descend the steep hill slowly and sensabilly, otherwise this plum would have sent me rocketing through the air to my death, no doubt.

My apologies to any responsible and sensable Range Rover drivers out there...

KK
(I owe my life to my superb Hayes 9 brakes... and keeping my balance)

Comments

  • supersonic
    supersonic Posts: 82,708
    You do get some clowns, but always keep a safe distance.
  • Whytepeak
    Whytepeak Posts: 2,616
    supersonic wrote:
    You do get some clowns, but always keep a safe distance.

    This is made more tricky when they try to drive into you. :evil:
    Now that we are strong ought to bear the infirmities of the weak and not to please ourselves. ROMANS 15:1
  • KonaKurt
    KonaKurt Posts: 720
    Super, keeping a safe distance is not easy when you are already coming down a 1:3! Besides, this plum lerched out from nowhere. Momentarilly saw this lone driver 'grinning' back at me in his mirror. Clear road ahead with perfect straight view, yet had fun ramming the brakes.

    Basket.

    KK.
  • Northwind
    Northwind Posts: 14,675
    No sense getting worked up about it, at the end of the day they're in a ton of steel and you're on a bent paperclip with bones for crumple zones. Like Neal Stephenson says in Zodiac, just ride like everyone else out there is trying to kill you.
    Uncompromising extremist
  • cheehee
    cheehee Posts: 427
    edited May 2009
    He sounds like the tw*t who had me off my motorbike.

    If you assume everyone driving a car is a complete, myopic numpty you should be reet.

    Cheehee

    <edited, Damn Northwinds lightning fingers> :wink:
  • noodleman
    noodleman Posts: 852
    Can never understand why car drivers give you so little room when they overtake, even when they have the whole of the other side of the road to move onto. Also had a huge lorry overtake when a car was coming the other way, as he started pulling back in, the trailer was getting closer and closer to me until it was literally inches from hitting me by the time the rear end passed me. Very dangerous and on another day with a nervous cyclist could have been nasty.
    Guess it's been a long time since most motorists have been on a bike, so they just see us a a nuisance and show no respect even though we have a right to be there. You could stay on the trails but like me, many folk like to mix their rides with a bit of road riding to link up the off road sections.
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  • blister pus
    blister pus Posts: 5,780
    Don't usually have a problem with motorists. Had one notable incident two months ago involving an old codger taxi driver where I'm climbing up an extremely steep single lane winding road and I'm pretty tucked in into the side as I can be and this 'personage' is up my arse beeping his horn and I've got nowhere else to go until I reach a point where i can swing in a bit and let him past. As he passed me I could see him giving me dirty looks, and he continued to do so until he realised I was eye-balling him - if he'd have stopped I'd have been in court.

    And I had one yesterday with a boozey red faced old codger (who is local) driving a tank of a diesel Merc at speed round similar blind bend single lane road, where by he had no clue as to how wide he was and the distance he left between wall and road. I had no choice but to slam the anchors on (and I'm barely travelling because i know it's a bad blind bend - and so does he) and he actually stopped dead by the side of me and asked if i was all right - like I was the problem. I said I was now you've stopped and I'm waiting for you to go past at reasonable speed.

    Apart from those two incidents I've found motorists to be pretty road savvy and aware. Unlike walkers who are, well....let's leave it there.
  • marinman1
    marinman1 Posts: 262
    in the summer i was riding back from the trails at fort william, heading towards spean bridge, this is a bitch of a cycle after so many runs of the 4X. i was going along tight as i could to the side of the road, most cars were fine until this lorry comes and does not move slightly for me, it seemed to get closer and closer until i was driven off the road right down the grassy verge. i was not happy. on the same journey back to the campsite one of my mates was clipped by a car, knocking their wingmirror off.

    then yesterday on my cycle to work i was pedalling hard, tyring not to hold up too many cars, i was a good bit in front of the nearest car anyway then the prick in his big BMW beeps his horn at me and out the window, angrily signals for me to move over for him, i had nowhere to go. as he overtook he shouted from his window, didnt quite catch what he said, but i can imagine. further up the road i overtook him.
  • bwfc4eva868
    bwfc4eva868 Posts: 717
    Car drivers are mostly a menace, yet its cyclists and motorbikes that are dangerous and should be banned apperantly.
  • Aldo001
    Aldo001 Posts: 251
    Not had too many bad ones, just some that p!$$ me off
    for example: once i was at traffic lights, they were at red so i was doing a trackstand 8), then as I beat the person in the car behind me off, the line, he beeped his horn at me
    That got me annoyed
    Another time some noob pulled out of a junction a i was screaming along the road at 20+MPH, I had to slam on the brakes and skidded to a halt. I saw this guy had his window down so I shouted some profanities at him :lol:
  • I've had two bad experiences with motorists...

    The first - Riding up a narrow street in Brighton on the way home from work, some chap decided it was a good idea to park in a loading bay and open his car door at the precise moment I rode past. This happens to me a lot and always manage to swerve, but unfortunately at the precise moment he opened his door I had glanced back to check if there was anything coming up behind me. Luckily there wasn't but unlukily I crunched against his door trapping my foot and spinning off my bike onto the tarmac. I've still got a red impact mark on my foot and it happened 6 weeks ago!

    The second - This was the closest call I've had other than the above. Shooting down a dual lane street in Brighton at about 20mph when some woman pulled out right in front of me without looking. I hit the brakes and managed to skid and narrowly avoided a collision with the rear end of her car, it would have been nasty. I promptly pulled up beside her at the next set of lights and informed her she's almost knocked me off my bike, she was very apologetic.

    The more that these things happen, the easier I find it to spot these people early enough to avoid them!

    Russ
  • Anonymous
    Anonymous Posts: 79,667
    ive had alot more trouble from cyclists than they have ever had from me.

    i ride on the road but ride as if i am a proper road user, not some c0ck on a bike, i wait my turn in traffic and keep out of the way of traffic, this way no one tries to knock me off and apart from one near miss with a lorry driver, ive had no trouble.

    i hate road riders who ride 2 abreast, i wouldnt if they were riding at a sensible speed but riding at 15 miles an hour occupying the whole road round blind bends is annoying as it can be averted by riding in single file.

    i hate road riders who think they have right of way when they dont, i was more than prepared to smash into one such individual who made eye contact and rode straght towards me in a trafic calming sytem which would only allow one car to pass and i was there first and had right of way. he quickly saw sense and shfited pretty expertly out of the way.

    i very nearly killed a youngster on a road bike today (who suprisingly was fully kitted out in high vis kit) as she pulled across the road as i attempted to overtake her slow ass. she didnt look to see if anything was behind her, its probably only my expert driving training which stopped me from running straight over her and her bike.

    this happens all of the time, more than i can remember so although the OP was clearly justified in being pi55ed at the driver in his story, i wonder how many riders who hate "bad drivers" are responsible for their own treatment.
  • randomage
    randomage Posts: 100
    I am regularly on both sides of this arguement. A few weeks ago I got caught out at dark without lights, and unfortunately part of the road has no pavements, making walking the bike along an accident waiting to happen! I'm getting past this section as fast as i can, when a bloke in a BMW comes right up behind me, honking and flashing, despite the fact the road is lit and i know for a fact that i am perfectly visible, wearing white trainers and light coloured 3/4 lengths. plus the fact i could see his lights reflecting off my legs.... he then decided to pull past me (2 lane road, no one coming the other way) close enough that he almost clipped my handlebar with his wing mirror.

    The other side of the story is cyclists on major roads (mostly roadies tbh) who take up a whole lane, and do it at 15 mph. they look behind, see the LONG line of cars behind, then preceed to cycle PAST a layby or junction. That kind of thing really gets on my nipples.
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  • XxxBFGxxX
    XxxBFGxxX Posts: 1,355
    Whytepeak wrote:
    supersonic wrote:
    You do get some clowns, but always keep a safe distance.

    This is made more tricky when they try to drive into you. :evil:

    had this happen to me before after a set of trafic lights steared into me but then he sh** him self wen i caught up with him and his mirror fell of by its self.

    how i kept my self from lamping the guy i dont know.
  • KonaKurt
    KonaKurt Posts: 720
    Hmmm.. sounds like there are quite a few muppets behind steering wheels, who most probably have no idea of what a road looks like from outside of a menacing motor vehicle. There are bound to be some good and bad of each bikers and motorists, but on average I find motorists the more guilty. In fact, on a public road cyclists are actually a PRIORITY against motor vehicles (Highway Code), a fact that many motorists fail to respect, or maybe even know at all! Most dissapointing of all, are drivers who are employed to drive (white vans, taxis, buses, artics etc) who should know alot better! (But no doubt, brag to themselves they they are superiour drivers because it's their living... even after they hit or nudge someone on a bike.

    Maybe we should all wear more helmet cam's, with yellow warning stickers on the back of our helmets...?"Helmet Cam in operation"? or "I love a courtroom and a good home movie".?

    KK

    PS: Check out this cycle accident legal specialist, I strongly recommend them! At least someone cares about us!

    http://www.bikeline.co.uk/

    :)
  • Chaz.Harding
    Chaz.Harding Posts: 3,144
    BUT, in all of this, you have to remember that there are two sides to the story. OK, I agree some of what's been written here is unacceptable. But if you didn't ride bikes, and your every experiance of cyclists was the little teenage sh1tbags who ride on £100 catalogue hand-me-downs, jumping off kerbs into traffic, swerving all over the road, nad generally being a menace, you would probably dislike cyclists to sy the least.

    BUT, as I just said, this doesn't excuse the car drivers of driving stupidly, and dangerously. It does maybe explain some the of the 'irrational' hatred and abuse we recieve.
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  • kingmho
    kingmho Posts: 37
    edited June 2009
    ...
    ...
    i very nearly killed a youngster on a road bike today (who suprisingly was fully kitted out in high vis kit) as she pulled across the road as i attempted to overtake her slow ass. she didnt look to see if anything was behind her, its probably only my expert driving training which stopped me from running straight over her and her bike.

    this happens all of the time, more than i can remember so although the OP was clearly justified in being pi55ed at the driver in his story, i wonder how many riders who hate "bad drivers" are responsible for their own treatment.

    Strictly speaking, she shouldn't have to look behind her, so long as she stayed within the lane she was in. She is in front and therefore has priority. The onus is on the overtaking vehicle to make sure it is safe to overtake, not the overtaken vehicle.

    The fact that she may have been cycling near the kerb to begin with, is a courtesy she is extending to overtaking vehicles i.e. she is doing YOU the favour, she doesn't have to. In fact, the official recommendation (see Cyclecraft) is to hog the entire lane, if it prevents vehicles from overtaking unsafely. Cycling 2-abreast achieves this automatically, and is entirely legal.
  • CycloRos
    CycloRos Posts: 579
    Rode into work this morning for the first time in over a month (torn calf muscle), and some moron in a white van decides to close the gap between himself and the kerb as he's crawling in a queue of traffic.

    By the time I realise what he's doing I'm along side him and I only just make it through, clipping the kerb with my pedal! I kept my cool but as I've gone past he gives me abuse so I flick him the bird and he then busts a gut to get past me again and once more drives inches from the kerb blocking me off.

    I decide I've had enough and this time overtake him on the right handside and pedal off into the distance...

    What I'd love to point out to this pr*ck is that I'm actually helping him out by not contributing to the ridiculous amounts of traffic he's currently sat in and that I, like him, am just trying to get to work 8)

    It's like most things really 99% of folk are respectful and courteous its just the 1% of morons out there that need a good slapping and unfortunately its those people you here most about.
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  • ive had alot more trouble from cyclists than they have ever had from me.

    i hate road riders who ride 2 abreast, i wouldnt if they were riding at a sensible speed but riding at 15 miles an hour occupying the whole road round blind bends is annoying as it can be averted by riding in single file.

    i hate road riders who think they have right of way when they dont, i was more than prepared to smash into one such individual who made eye contact and rode straght towards me in a trafic calming sytem which would only allow one car to pass and i was there first and had right of way. he quickly saw sense and shfited pretty expertly out of the way.

    i very nearly killed a youngster on a road bike today (who suprisingly was fully kitted out in high vis kit) as she pulled across the road as i attempted to overtake her slow ass. she didnt look to see if anything was behind her, its probably only my expert driving training which stopped me from running straight over her and her bike.

    this happens all of the time, more than i can remember so although the OP was clearly justified in being pi55ed at the driver in his story, i wonder how many riders who hate "bad drivers" are responsible for their own treatment.

    You shouldn't be trying to overtake on a blind corner, I would suggest the cyclists in these cases are trying to protect themselves from morons doing exactly this by keeping the traffic behind them.
    And if you are quite prepared to smash into a cyclist for whatever reason you should really start to think whether or not you are mentally stable enough to be in charge of any vehicle on or off the road!!
    There are always people out there on the road who don't take things seriously or are even aware that they are putting lives in danger. Put your 'expert driving skills' to good use and be happy that you may have helped them to live another day :D
  • Daz555
    Daz555 Posts: 3,976
    edited June 2009
    i hate road riders who ride 2 abreast, i wouldnt if they were riding at a sensible speed but riding at 15 miles an hour occupying the whole road round blind bends is annoying as it can be averted by riding in single file.
    Why should it matter if they ride, 2 or even 3 abreast? You should overtake a cyclist in the same manner you do for a car, not just squeeze past.

    And why does it matter what they do round blind bends? You 100% should not be overtaking there anyway.

    Highway code Section 163 "give motorcyclists, cyclists and horse riders at least as much room as you would when overtaking a car"

    dg_070531.jpg

    Ahh just noticed. 2 abreast is legal, 3 is not.

    There you go. Highway code is a handy thing to read. 8)
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  • cheehee
    cheehee Posts: 427
    Daz555 wrote:
    i hate road riders who ride 2 abreast, i wouldnt if they were riding at a sensible speed but riding at 15 miles an hour occupying the whole road round blind bends is annoying as it can be averted by riding in single file.
    Why should it matter if they ride, 2 or even 3 abreast? You should overtake a cyclist in the same manner you do for a car, not just squeeze past.

    And why does it matter what they do round blind bends? You 100% should not be overtaking there anyway.

    Good point, it is legal to ride two abreast................
  • Stumpy Ade
    Stumpy Ade Posts: 81
    ive had alot more trouble from cyclists than they have ever had from me.

    i ride on the road but ride as if i am a proper road user, not some c0ck on a bike, i wait my turn in traffic and keep out of the way of traffic, this way no one tries to knock me off and apart from one near miss with a lorry driver, ive had no trouble.

    i hate road riders who ride 2 abreast, i wouldnt if they were riding at a sensible speed but riding at 15 miles an hour occupying the whole road round blind bends is annoying as it can be averted by riding in single file.

    i hate road riders who think they have right of way when they dont, i was more than prepared to smash into one such individual who made eye contact and rode straght towards me in a trafic calming sytem which would only allow one car to pass and i was there first and had right of way. he quickly saw sense and shfited pretty expertly out of the way.

    i very nearly killed a youngster on a road bike today (who suprisingly was fully kitted out in high vis kit) as she pulled across the road as i attempted to overtake her slow ass. she didnt look to see if anything was behind her, its probably only my expert driving training which stopped me from running straight over her and her bike.

    this happens all of the time, more than i can remember so although the OP was clearly justified in being pi55ed at the driver in his story, i wonder how many riders who hate "bad drivers" are responsible for their own treatment.


    Guilty. :oops:

    I pulled out in front of a car yesterday, I was very lucky not to be hit. Obviously I didn't do it on purpose, I just didn't see him :oops: the driver was rightly very p155ed off.

    I've learned a lesson.

    Still when I think of all the times I've been on the recieving end, I think I'm owed one.
  • Northwind
    Northwind Posts: 14,675
    Daz555 wrote:
    Why should it matter if they ride, 2 or even 3 abreast? You should overtake a cyclist in the same manner you do for a car, not just squeeze past.

    Yup... Riding 2 abreast can be a valuable defensive riding tool, since it helps stop idiots from squeezing past you in the same lane. But unfortunately it brings out the worst in some cretins, who'll then get angry and possibly do something even more stupid, so it's a useful tool but you need to be very careful with it.
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  • Northwind wrote:
    Daz555 wrote:
    Why should it matter if they ride, 2 or even 3 abreast? You should overtake a cyclist in the same manner you do for a car, not just squeeze past.

    Yup... Riding 2 abreast can be a valuable defensive riding tool, since it helps stop idiots from squeezing past you in the same lane. But unfortunately it brings out the worst in some cretins, who'll then get angry and possibly do something even more stupid, so it's a useful tool but you need to be very careful with it.
    And if there aren't two of you available to achieve this check behind and move into a positon which prevents some one trying to squeeze by, be confident, drivers will for the most part respect this. Engage with other road users, look at them and make eye contact if you can safely. If you cycle as though you don't belong on the road, other road users will treat you accordingly...