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amey
Velocio
And the solution was... ride the Robin Mather, as that has mudguards.
So today I did that.
And then got run off the road three times, chased into a carpark, and had to call the police.
Yup. Insane. Feels like #brexit is affecting more than just politics and the economy, the anger and rage is more palpable than ever.
I'd gone into the ASL at the Blackfriars Bridge, Southwark Street junction, ended up in front of a scooter rider (along with another 10 or 15 cyclists who were in the front of the scooters and motorbikes). When the light changed we got away first, but were not going fast enough or perhaps it was perceived that we were still in the way... I stayed on the right hand side of the single lane Southwark Street as I turn right on Great Suffolk St barely 100m later.
When I indicated that I was turning (yup, I do this... I ride the Mather like an old man from a lost age), the scooter behind me roared into action, accelerated as fast as he could, swept by on my right missing by centimetres. I gesticulated a shrug of "wtf was the point in that?" and it began...
He slowed down to force me to stop, then tried to cut me off from my left and into the oncoming traffic on the right. By fortune we'd got to Sumner St + Great Suffolk St so I took a small gap between cars and turned through moving traffic onto Great Suffolk St... and he followed me! Fast too, I can't imagine what move he did to achieve that.
He cut me off again, from my right now and driving me into the kerb shouting something incoherent from his helmet. Fortune again, I hadn't stopped and we'd gone 25m and I was at Lavington Street so I turned left, lost him for a moment again.
He followed, and cut me off again forcing me to an almost complete stop and reach across to me. I carried on, squeezed through a gap, ducked between two oncoming cars, and was in front of my work car park. It's a nice car park, a gated affair with security control and lots of cameras.
Safe now, I locked up. But he was still there!
He'd parked up outside, was pacing back and forth, essentially not letting me out of the car park, and still shouting and raging. When I approached him (through the fence) he swore and said he'd thump me, so I took a photo of his number plate and called the police. At first he carried on swearing, then when it was obvious I was really actually calling the police he stopped bristling, spoke a little more calmly, said that "indicating and being in front does not mean you own the road" (eh?) and then got on his scooter and rode off towards Suffolk Street and Borough.
What an eventful commute though. To go from years of peaceful rides, to suddenly being cut up and chased off the road, intimidated and threatened.
The police were great. They arrived in 10 minutes. I gave them the details, and the number plate ( LL14 0ZF - a white honda ), as much of a description as possible for someone fully bedecked in a black Northface motorcycle get-up and white helmet (with mirrored glasses on). The building security has CCTV too.
The only issue is that the police seemed more obsessed with the single threat to punch and the general intimidation, than with what I felt to be the real incident: trying to drive someone off the road multiple times (dangerous driving), and the chasing someone to confront them (road rage).
Still... in the office now, and will get on with work.