My elder son had a near miss today coming home from a training blat. There may be some benefit to younger riders in sharing this, so I will:
We'd had a mild, new-year-type spinny ride into the local lanes and were ambling home after our 'finish point'. I was about 50 metres ahead and saw a car being driven oddly where a minor road joined our road from the left. The car was well back from the Give Way stripes, but rolling forward like an old-school automatic at idle. The driver (about 65 to 75) seemed to be looking at a map on the passenger seat. She looked up at me for an instant, but appeared oblivious to my presence.
I knew son the elder was coming that way, but he was too far back to yell to. I just kept going and kept looking back. Son came up to the junction in something like recovery mode, folded over the bars and breathing deeply...
Out came the car on cue, right across his bow. He braked and all was well. He is a diplomatic fellow, so no words were spoken. He put a foot down, but more in relief than out of necessity.
Once he'd come up to me, I asked if he'd seen the car being 'odd' and he had. He'd realised the driver was somehow with the fairies and had slowed in curiosity and anticipation. Happily, he'd read the whole thing very well and saw that this was a SMIDSY waiting to happen.
Not for the first time, I was surprised how much of a jolt one gets from seeing one's offspring in jeopardy.
The moral I would have given him from the story if he hadn't already sussed it out was this: If another road user appears to be driving, riding or walking oddly or illogically or unpredictably, get ready for a surprise.
He did and he was and he braked on cue.
On an unconnected theme, wasn't the wind a bastard this morning?
We'd had a mild, new-year-type spinny ride into the local lanes and were ambling home after our 'finish point'. I was about 50 metres ahead and saw a car being driven oddly where a minor road joined our road from the left. The car was well back from the Give Way stripes, but rolling forward like an old-school automatic at idle. The driver (about 65 to 75) seemed to be looking at a map on the passenger seat. She looked up at me for an instant, but appeared oblivious to my presence.
I knew son the elder was coming that way, but he was too far back to yell to. I just kept going and kept looking back. Son came up to the junction in something like recovery mode, folded over the bars and breathing deeply...
Out came the car on cue, right across his bow. He braked and all was well. He is a diplomatic fellow, so no words were spoken. He put a foot down, but more in relief than out of necessity.
Once he'd come up to me, I asked if he'd seen the car being 'odd' and he had. He'd realised the driver was somehow with the fairies and had slowed in curiosity and anticipation. Happily, he'd read the whole thing very well and saw that this was a SMIDSY waiting to happen.
Not for the first time, I was surprised how much of a jolt one gets from seeing one's offspring in jeopardy.
The moral I would have given him from the story if he hadn't already sussed it out was this: If another road user appears to be driving, riding or walking oddly or illogically or unpredictably, get ready for a surprise.
He did and he was and he braked on cue.
On an unconnected theme, wasn't the wind a bastard this morning?
