Near misses

[Chad]

Whilst in Rotheberg, I was just approaching a set of traffic lights (on green) along a line of stationary traffic, when a police car of all things decide to pull out into my lane. Full on emergency stop, two up on a bend at about 30mph. Instinctively I sat the bike up to brake but missed this police car by about a foot. My wife slid forward and bumped her helmet on mine. Not happy- I give them my horn and an inquisitive hand gesture (ie what are you doing?) but they just looked, drove away & I could see them laughing at each other as they drove ahead. I spoke to the hotelier about this & he said if you had challenged them there would be know doubt I would have been a ticket?!! Incredible. If my new helmet had been chipped there would have been hell on

[Spencert231]

Maybe they were women police officers and they were comparing eyebrows or mascara or rouge colours in the their review mirrors when you rudely disturbed them :-[

[Chad]

I can put my mascara on when driving no problem... admittedly it's more difficult when I'm on the bike.

[Spencert231]

That dear Chad is the feminine side coming out and you must learn to control it. On a more serious note was there any lessons to be learned from the incident.

[Chad]

Well re lessons to be learnt, I always ride with the believe that all other road users probably will pullout, change lanes etc. without looking, and consequently I ride in anticipation of this. It's kept me upright for 30 yrs. In this case I should perhaps have given extra thought to the exceptional possible manoeuvres of a police car ie they do drive on the wrong side of the roads, drive through red lights, move unexpectedly etc. however, they usually have the courtesy to put on the blues & twos before they do this to give us all half a chance. It was undoubtedly their fault on this occasion (I wasn't filtering, I was riding in my own lane) but fortunately I was riding appropriate to the conditions and as such stopped safely. But it does remind one to never take one's eye off the ball. They're only human at the end of the day so no harm done. I was very impressed with  my LC however, no snatch, no diving at the front etc.