my name is mwd

This week I went to the first of three lessons by BikeSafe, an initiative ran by Police forces around the UK to educate bikers further about safe driving. The lessons are classroom based; the first one concentrated on the mental aspects of riding safely, with subsequent lessons covering cornering and overtaking in detail. Following the classroom lessons will be a one hour riding session. Hopefully these will fill in some of the bits I felt were missing from my original training, which did a fine job at mastering the bike safely, but I felt left out a lot of the application in real road situations.

The first lesson was very interesting. Partly this was down to the bike related content, but also partly just listening to a traffic officer’s view on various things. As ever, seeing things from another aspect is always interesting. To some degree the lesson was a reminder of what most of us already knew – but even that in itself can be good. Driving becomes such a mundane task at times, particularly when commuting, I suspect that even the best of us sometimes take it for granted. It’s nice to be reminded about the dangers directly, and they stick home more solidly when backed up with a combination of statistics and anecdotes from someone who’s experienced the bad side of it all. It’s one thing to hear it from a driving instructor, it’s another to hear it from the man who has to deliver bad news to families due to a road accident (no matter what vehicle was involved).

The other very good thing though is that it’s well pitched. BikeSafe was set up by a biker in the Police force (not mentioned at the course, but there was an interview with the man responsible in a recent DOCUK magazine), and is taught by bikers. They understand what attracts people to biking, and their aim is to keep the roads safer whilst enjoying the experience. Indeed, one of the points was that we should enjoy the fact we’re on the best possible way to get around, and remember that when we’re late/rushed, or traffic cuts us up, or things generally get in the way – a positive mental attitude by remembering this will help keep you alert, rather than distracted by the negatives.

There was of course much more to the evening, and I do recommend it (assuming it’s taught as well as it was in Sawston). At £35 I think it’s easily worth it, and that’s ignoring the insurance benefits from having attended the course (I’m in a two year pre-paid deal anyway insurance-wise). As a light end to this entry, here’s a video they showed. It impressed me by being well pitched for a public service announcement, and enjoyable to watch whilst carrying a message. I do recommend you watch the high resolution version, but if you’re lazy then there’s the you tube version below.