This under taking thing .....

[BentMikey]

MacB, you're arguing about a minor detail, whilst agreeing with the principle of my point. Is there any need to be so argumentative? Your little bone of contention has nothing to do with my original point, and doesn't detract from that point at all.

 

[Greenbank]

The additional point made, by yourself and Greenbank, is that, despite your vast experience you're both still learning. Following that logic then you couldn't fully train me in 3 months.

No, you're misunderstanding it.

Apart from a couple of hours of Cycling Proficiency back when I was about 10 years old I've had no other formal cycle training.

I've never been a member of a cycling club. The closest thing would be Audax UK but often long solitary rides are completely different from intense pack riding of a club run every week where etiquette and discipline are drilled into you otherwise you end up doing something stupid to take out a whole bunch of you.

And my reading is limited to just the Highway Code and Cyclecraft. The latter I should probably read again.

So, I've never completed anything near the total suggested training (miles or time) in any of those categories and I know, and am happy to admit, that I'm still learning new stuff all the time.

 

[MacB]

BM, your original post:-

I think it was John Forrester who estimated it'll take 500 miles to gain vehicular cycling confidence with lessons, 5,000 miles from a book, and 50,000 miles riding on your own.

My original response:-

Would this person have a vested interest in cycle training? IMHO 50K is just a gross exagerration.

Your first defence, ignoring the 'roll eyes' effort:-

Regardless of what you think of JF, it's probably not ridiculously far wrong.

The thread then degenerates as, despite being asked to backup your stats, you choose to attribute more and more fanciful meanings to what I've posted. A real classic is:-


So you're saying your opinion is more valid and more likely to be true than an acknowledged expert? LOLOL!

I was questioning the validity of quoted stats, nothing more and nothing less. When you say acknowledged expert I take it you mean in cycling not in crunching stats? On the evidence provided so far I'd rate him as amateurish, at best, in the world of stats. The 10-20 year/50k line is more akin to something employed by a desperate sales person than anything else.

You then post up:-

Exactly. What's important to me is the overall point that learning on your own takes much longer than learning with other cyclists which takes longer than learning in formal lessons.

MacB, why don't you make your own guess as to the ratios between the categories given in Origamist's post and post them here?

I agree with your first point here and if you'd posted that in the first place there would have been no argument. Your second point is asking me to do your legwork, you want the stats get them yourself.

The next effort is to try and twist around the pattern of the debate:-

That implies you do agree with the general principle that formal lessons will give you more knowledge much more quickly, and that you'll take longest learning traffic skills on your own. Which was my point in the post I made.

The rest of it just seems to be you being argumentative, and unwilling to accept that you have anything new to learn in traffic skills.

This is you trying to say that what you meant was X and I shouldn't have taken your literally at value Y. Then you sneak in a little blame attack and accuse me of being unwilling to learn.........based on what exactly???


Now stop with the injured party routine, you post unsupported stats they'll be attacked, this has NOTHING to do with cycling.

 

[MacB]

No, you're misunderstanding it.

Apart from a couple of hours of Cycling Proficiency back when I was about 10 years old I've had no other formal cycle training.

I've never been a member of a cycling club. The closest thing would be Audax UK but often long solitary rides are completely different from intense pack riding of a club run every week where etiquette and discipline are drilled into you otherwise you end up doing something stupid to take out a whole bunch of you.

And my reading is limited to just the Highway Code and Cyclecraft. The latter I should probably read again.

So, I've never completed anything near the total suggested training (miles or time) in any of those categories and I know, and am happy to admit, that I'm still learning new stuff all the time.

Nope, not misunderstanding anything, never claimed I wasn't still learning. Also never claimed that training didn't speed up the learning process.

So why are you cycling if you're still learning? or do you believe that you have actually learnt enough to be sdafe to cycle?

 

[BentMikey]

LOL, you certainly got out of the wrong side of your bed this morning! Have a virtual ginger nut and a hot cuppa, I'm just about to make myself one.

 

[jimboalee]

Did JF and Jimbolee go to school together

No.

Jimboalee was riding to junior school on his bike when John Forrester was still in Cloud Cuckoo Land.

 

[Norm]

LOL, you certainly got out of the wrong side of your bed this morning! Have a virtual ginger nut and a hot cuppa, I'm just about to make myself one.

Ooh, do me one, milk and one sugar, please.

 

[Rhythm Thief]

LOL, you certainly got out of the wrong side of your bed this morning! Have a virtual ginger nut and a hot cuppa, I'm just about to make myself one.

Well, it is intensely irritating when you argue points that no one was making in the first place, post some platitudinous garbage like "ignorance and attitude = so amusing!!", wilfully misinterpret people's posts and then play the injured party. I don't blame MacB for sticking up for himself.

 

[BentMikey]

There is another side than MacB's to that view, you know.

 

[MacB]

There is another side than MacB's to that view, you know.

Would that be the 'having the final say' game and trying to do it as patronisingly as possible?

 

[4F]

BM, your original post:-

I think it was John Forrester who estimated wildy plucked a figure out of the air with no means of evidence that it'll take 500 miles to gain vehicular cycling confidence with lessons, 5,000 miles from a book, and 50,000 miles riding on your own.

Fixed that part, honestly BM you would argue that black was white

 

[Greenbank]

So why are you cycling if you're still learning? or do you believe that you have actually learnt enough to be sdafe to cycle?

Yes, but that's a very simplistic way of putting it.

If you pass a car driving test do you think that:
a) you're safe to drive?
you have nothing else to learn about driving?

I feel I've learnt enough to feel safe cycling on the majority of roads (nothing will make me want to ride along some of the bypass stretches of the A3 but pretty much everything else is fair game) otherwise I wouldn't do it at all. But just because I've learnt enough to feel safe to cycle doesn't mean that I can't learn more to make it even safer for myself (and for others).

And just because I've been able to avoid any serious incidents isn't proof that I know enough to be safe, it's only proof that I've been lucky so far. The minor scrapes I sometimes get myself in to are proof that I've still got stuff to learn, there may also be other bad traits or dodgy behaviour that I'm blissfully unaware of.

 

[BentMikey]

Well, you can pick on JF's estimates all you like, but I don't see anyone arguing against my original point on how you'll learn much more quickly from formal lessons. It's pretty obvious that there are lots of people out there who aren't doing too well learning on their own.

Anyone would think it's some kind of assault on your manhood the way you've tried to argue otherwise. So what if that distance is only 20,000 miles, or 100,000 miles? Still has no real effect on my OP.

Again, let's have your estimates on what the distances and ratios should be for the given example. Lee, perhaps you have the courage to post your guess?

 

[MacB]

Well, you can pick on JF's estimates all you like, but I don't see anyone arguing against my original point on how you'll learn much more quickly from formal lessons. It's pretty obvious that there are lots of people out there who aren't doing too well learning on their own.

Anyone would think it's some kind of assault on your manhood the way you've tried to argue otherwise. So what if that distance is only 20,000 miles, or 100,000 miles? Still has no real effect on my OP.

Again, let's have your estimates on what the distances and ratios should be for the given example. Lee, perhaps you have the courage to post your guess?

Fail again BM, stop trying to make this an issue for others, either you believe there is a stat or there isn't. No-one has questioned the value of formal training and no-one sees anything here as an assault on their manhood. I also can't find any evidence of anyone claiming to be perfect or have nothing left to learn.....stop inventing stuff.

 

[Rhythm Thief]

Well, you can pick on JF's estimates all you like, but I don't see anyone arguing against my original point on how you'll learn much more quickly from formal lessons. It's pretty obvious that there are lots of people out there who aren't doing too well learning on their own.

Anyone would think it's some kind of assault on your manhood the way you've tried to argue otherwise. So what if that distance is only 20,000 miles, or 100,000 miles? Still has no real effect on my OP.

Again, let's have your estimates on what the distances and ratios should be for the given example. Lee, perhaps you have the courage to post your guess?

No one's arguing with the general principle of what you've posted, just the frankly ridiculous figures that Franklin appears to have plucked out of thin air and which you've quoted in hushed tones as though they were some kind of gospel truth.

But now I think about it, my philosophy would be more along the lines of "tell me, and I forget; show me, and I remember; let me learn it for myself and I understand". That's certainly how I learnt most things in my life - from cycling and driving (yes, really - obviously I had lessons to get my licence, but I'd been driving my dad's vehicles since I was seven years old and had pretty good road sense and car control skills before I got my L plates) - to playing the guitar. I'm not saying lessons would teach me nothing - nor that I've got nothing left to learn - but I'd probably forget most of it unless I learned it by experience. Other people perhaps learn things differently, and that's great.