chthonic
Über Member
I've had a few days to calm down from this one and reflect on my own actions as well as the nutcase who tried to attack me.
Cycling home I go down an industrial street in Islington - it's got numerous big depots all along it including an ambulance station, Mann and Overton's main showroom, a recording studio, a car hire place, a PA hire place, you name it. This means continuous van/lorry/coach movements and a lot of taxis parking up temporarily awaiting repair. Plus there's my kids' school - my main reason for going down there regularly. It's a 20mph limit.
Anyway, it's usually fine as long as you don't hug the gutter - everyone manoeuvres at low speed and I know a lot of the drivers to at least wave at.
Friday lunchtime I was going home early and was following several cars. We'd just left a light controlled junction so were gently accelerating up to around 18/20mph. I was out in primary and arguably a little too close to the car in front, but was pacing it nicely. Tailwind
Suddenly, there's a white courier van on my right, driver gesticulating wildly. He's tried to overtake but of course has nowhere to go. I told him to back off.
He then proceeded to chase me down the road, revving away, swerving alongside me then dropping back repeatedly, then tried to push me sideways so quickly that I had to slap the side of the van to get him to back off enough to allow me room to brake and drop behind him.
Of course this causes him to brake and swerve to the road, screaming out the window to Come Here! Not wanting to get into a fight, I kept going. He chased me again, overtook properly this time and then cut in again with me on his inside. Shouting about my "being in the middle of the road" I tried to explain as calmly as I could through the adenaline that there was no room for him to overtake at that point, there was nowhere for him to go.
This was when he got out of the van and ran round to try and kick me. I accelerated as hard as I could and he made contact with my rear pannier - it was that close. He then sped off.
Now, forget prosecuting him, cutting his goolies off, etc, etc (I've talked to his company, am writing to his boss etc as the taxi following us chased the guy down and got his plates), the nagging worry is that I COULD have avoided all this by braking and dropping behind the guy right at the start. As in, if I'd allowed him to cut me up, we'd just have proceeded. He'd have had his bad driving rewarded, but I'd have been arguably safer. Sure I'd have not known that, but at the time I didn't consider it.
Challenged to a fight for road space, I rose to it and then had to deal with the consequences. Something to think about.
Cycling home I go down an industrial street in Islington - it's got numerous big depots all along it including an ambulance station, Mann and Overton's main showroom, a recording studio, a car hire place, a PA hire place, you name it. This means continuous van/lorry/coach movements and a lot of taxis parking up temporarily awaiting repair. Plus there's my kids' school - my main reason for going down there regularly. It's a 20mph limit.
Anyway, it's usually fine as long as you don't hug the gutter - everyone manoeuvres at low speed and I know a lot of the drivers to at least wave at.
Friday lunchtime I was going home early and was following several cars. We'd just left a light controlled junction so were gently accelerating up to around 18/20mph. I was out in primary and arguably a little too close to the car in front, but was pacing it nicely. Tailwind
Suddenly, there's a white courier van on my right, driver gesticulating wildly. He's tried to overtake but of course has nowhere to go. I told him to back off.
He then proceeded to chase me down the road, revving away, swerving alongside me then dropping back repeatedly, then tried to push me sideways so quickly that I had to slap the side of the van to get him to back off enough to allow me room to brake and drop behind him.
Of course this causes him to brake and swerve to the road, screaming out the window to Come Here! Not wanting to get into a fight, I kept going. He chased me again, overtook properly this time and then cut in again with me on his inside. Shouting about my "being in the middle of the road" I tried to explain as calmly as I could through the adenaline that there was no room for him to overtake at that point, there was nowhere for him to go.
This was when he got out of the van and ran round to try and kick me. I accelerated as hard as I could and he made contact with my rear pannier - it was that close. He then sped off.
Now, forget prosecuting him, cutting his goolies off, etc, etc (I've talked to his company, am writing to his boss etc as the taxi following us chased the guy down and got his plates), the nagging worry is that I COULD have avoided all this by braking and dropping behind the guy right at the start. As in, if I'd allowed him to cut me up, we'd just have proceeded. He'd have had his bad driving rewarded, but I'd have been arguably safer. Sure I'd have not known that, but at the time I didn't consider it.
Challenged to a fight for road space, I rose to it and then had to deal with the consequences. Something to think about.