should i take lessons?

[surfgurl]

Poolcue and anyone else,

I quite often go for a ride in the early evenings around all the local roads. Try and go before dark, but after 6pm when most of the car commuters will be home. There are lots of little housing estates and odd roads leading to places all over my town. There doesn't tend to be a lot of traffic on these roads, but there are lots of parked cars. Treat every parked car as though someone may fling open a door at any second. Get used to giving cars space and manouvering around the them. Find a quiet mini roundabout and practice going round and turning off while signalling. Work out lane positions and how you would signal where you are going while turning sharp corners.
I've found this really helpful and gave me the confidence to go out on the same roads when there was a bit more traffic.

 

[Perry]

Treat every parked car as though someone may fling open a door at any second..

Great advice!

 

[summerdays]

Poolcue, when I started out I only rode on the really really quiet back streets, and would either get off and walk across any busy roads or even .. shock horror, ride on the pavements. Gradually the number of roads I felt confident on increased.

My main confidence memory was the time that instead of getting off my bike and going through an underpass to a roundabout (St James Barton roundabout), I saw a cyclist ahead of me and thought... I'm going to follow him on. That is still a significant memory almost 2 years on now.