- News
- Reviews
- Bikes
- Accessories
- Accessories - misc
- Computer mounts
- Bags
- Bar ends
- Bike bags & cases
- Bottle cages
- Bottles
- Cameras
- Car racks
- Child seats
- Computers
- Glasses
- GPS units
- Helmets
- Lights - front
- Lights - rear
- Lights - sets
- Locks
- Mirrors
- Mudguards
- Racks
- Pumps & CO2 inflators
- Puncture kits
- Reflectives
- Smart watches
- Stands and racks
- Trailers
- Clothing
- Components
- Bar tape & grips
- Bottom brackets
- Brake & gear cables
- Brake & STI levers
- Brake pads & spares
- Brakes
- Cassettes & freewheels
- Chains
- Chainsets & chainrings
- Derailleurs - front
- Derailleurs - rear
- Forks
- Gear levers & shifters
- Groupsets
- Handlebars & extensions
- Headsets
- Hubs
- Inner tubes
- Pedals
- Quick releases & skewers
- Saddles
- Seatposts
- Stems
- Wheels
- Tyres
- Health, fitness and nutrition
- Tools and workshop
- Miscellaneous
- Buyers Guides
- Features
- Forum
- Recommends
- Podcast
forum
Pulled by the fuzz
You're not gonna believe this.
On a club ride out of Sheffield, into Derbyshire and back again this evening the following occured:
When we were on the road between Hathersage and Calver, just after turning right at the junction in Grindleford- we were pulled over by a police car.
I say pulled over, but what actually happened was he wound down his passenger window, turned on his blues and started screaming at us that we had to ride single file- I shouldn't need to explain that we took exception to this.
So, after some exchange of words through the window of a moving police car, he pulled over and we obliged by stopping with him to see what ill-informed gems of made up law that he had up his sleeve. And gems they were.
He started by puffing out his chest and shouting "right then, who was it that had a problem?", which was (a threatening and b) wholly uncalled for. He went on to shout and spit about the highway code saying that cyclists had to ride single file and that we were in the wrong. We all know this is bollocks and tried to point this out to him, but he'd clearly made up his mind.
He then went on to say that he had it all on camera so I asked to see it, he put it on the dashboard screen and I watched the back of a bus for 3 minutes- not a cyclist in site. Apparently we were "all over the road", even though he couldn't actually see us and we were riding 2-by-2.
Then the cracker came- what I believe is a made-up story. PC ' I am the law' recently attended a coroners hearing about a car that had made a dangerous overtake move on a blind bend and killed a kid in a car on the other side of the road that it crashed into. The nugget is that he blamed it on a cyclist on the inside that had- and I quote- "made the driver do it"!!!!!!
It was eventually diffused when we pointed out that we were actually blocking the road now and that we disagree with everything he was saying. Surely, if we'd committed an offence at least one of us would have been booked?
I think this is a simple case of someone in a car (this time a copper no less) getting frustrated at being held up and taking it out on the easiest, most vulnerable target. Us. It would be nice if they'd teach our police officers the law, so that when they attempt to relay it to unwary 'offenders' that they actually got it right.
Just another case of the abuse of perceived power and the harassment and victimization of innocent cyclists.
A complaint will be duly posted with the IPCC. If the other 4 riders would like to be included I think that will help prevent this ill-informed bully from picking on any more cyclists for taking in part in the sport that they love.
More to come........
If you're new please join in and if you have questions pop them below and the forum regulars will answer as best we can.
Latest Forum Topics
Latest Comments
- ktache 4 min 20 sec ago
Surely some nice bright colours, some stripes, it is the seaside. Like beach huts...
- Jimnm 38 min 8 sec ago
Perhaps they need to reduce prices dramatically and try to rely on turnover to make a profit. Bikes are more expensive than some motor vehicles...
- MichaelWinnerRIP 41 min 15 sec ago
Italian tourist and pussycat in Portugal.
- Mark Bickerton 45 min 30 sec ago
Ha... I think for us at Tern Bicycles it is normal protocol for the UK!
- Backladder 57 min 1 sec ago
Am I the only one who thinks the brake levers look awful too?
- David9694 1 hour 29 min ago
Yep, it's official - reds under the, er, bonnet...
- Rendel Harris 2 hours 8 min ago
Indeed, I was drawing from personal experience – I don't use it that often but it's such a nice bit of infrastructure that I sometimes go out of my...
- paulgardener@gmail.com 2 hours 12 min ago
Except socialism doesn't work like that in real life. It's the capitals countries that try to look after those in need, and the average person's...
- KDee 3 hours 9 min ago
It's the mass that's the issue. Two people on a petrol powered scooter can really mess up a cyclist. Also the fact so many of the petrol scooters...
- andystow 3 hours 36 min ago
The new RH tubes claim to solve that issue, but price and availability is a problem. I tried to get some to try out, but they went out of stock on...
Add new comment
41 comments
@colin267 - nope, we were riding in two lines, unless you saw our group passing another cyclist on the climb....
Hmmm. He wouldn't happen to have been 40 something, about 6ft, dark hair but greying would he?
Interesting to see this post. Was in the Peaks this weekend with a group of around 20 riders (up from Essex to bag Holme Moss now it's going to be a Tour climb!!)
On the Friday we rode out via Calver and past Chatsworth. So very close to the location the OP was about. Had a queue of perhaps 15 cars behind us, the road is narrow and double white lined and we were travelling at 16mph or thereabouts, but we were going to turn off at Beeley (so probably hold up traffic for half a mile max).
Got pulled up by an officer in a traffic car (BMW estate) who gave us an earful about our 'duty of care to other road users' (don't know too many cases of people in cars being vulnerable to the actions of a cyclist...) and said we had to ride single file - not two abreast.
I know which I consider safer for me. And agree with the points above about whether a slow moving farm vehicle or similar would have elicited the same reaction.
Sadly wasn't on the ball enough to get his collar number to make a complaint....
@ Sanderson - you weren't by any chance one of the group I observed riding up the hill out of Grindleford on Fri afternoon, 3 abreast? We really don't make it easy for ourselves sometimes, do we!
This is car/truck drivers we're talking about so Yes - yes they *very* much do
Didn't you know it is the Dog-given right of all motor vehicle drivers to take any risks they like in order to get to the next set of lights or junction 5 seconds faster?
bobmac892 I agree entirely.
Please don't use my story as an excuse to voice generalised negative opinions against the police. This is the first time I've come across an officer with anything other than a positive attitude.
He is a very bad example and I have written in with a view to having this particular incident highlighted and dealt with. Of course there are some examples above with similar experiences and they should be explored also, but lets not tar them all with the same brush.
We don't like it when people make generalised comments about us "bloody cyclists", so lets not carry on the trend.
Whilst I have no arguement with the article I would wish to say one thing, not everyone in a police uniform behave in this way. In fact some are even known to cycle themselves and have quite the opposite view to this example.
Thank you, at last someone with a bit of commonsense. I could spout a myriad of stories of having dealt with, nearly being hit by and law breaking cyclists but whats the point ?
In this day and age we come across bad apples in all walks of life and this is an example of such. It is not, however, a free for all to spout off which the author did not want.
Let him amke his complaint and hopefully the officer will be spoken to.
Can i just add its quicker to contact the force's "professional standards" dept first rather than the ipcc as they will send it back to the force to investigate. If there is serious foul play involved then the force will pass to the ipcc for a full independant investigation but generally a force will deal with the issue such as described above. Hope that helps for anyone wanting to make a complaint.
I can comment only from personal experience but there has been a lot of it over the years and I have found the police to be an organization of lazy, corrupt, self important criminal thugs, every single one of them. My immediate family alone have suffered not only apathy from the police but abuse, harrassment, assault and rape. Defend these bastards as much as you want but you are deluding yourselves, they are not the good guys.
Also, it's far harder to overtake one line of say 10 riders than a group of 10 riders riding 2-up. You've got effectively twice the length of vehicle to overtake, so it can actually make it easier to pass a line of riders in pairs
Sounds to me that even if you were riding single file on that road, nobody should overtake until it was absolutely safe to do so.
If motorists approached overtaking cyclists as if they were overtaking another car - IE waiting for a gap in oncoming traffic and moving out into the opposite lane - then it wouldn't matter if riders were cycling two abreast would it?
Unfortunately a lot of drivers believe they don't need to slow down and wait to pass cyclists safely. That's the problem.
If the road is too narrow/twisty to be able to overtake a pair (or lines of pairs) safely and the cyclist isn't riding in the gutter, there's no way being single file makes it easier to safely overtake.
This - absolutely this. If an overtake is made safely, it's no harder to overtake a pair of riders than a single.
Just because the law says we can ride 2 abreast, doesn't make it right to do so.
Inconsiderate club riders in groups of 30 odd with massive q's of vehicles behind them. I'd be cheesed off too.
It's why I choose not to ride with the club that I belong to.
If you are in a group of 30 riders, that's 15 riders at 2 abreast, the group will take up approximately 100 feet of road. In single file that's 200 feet that the car/bus/lorry has to get past, so simple arithmetic shows that riding 2 abreast causes less delay. And so what if vehicles have to wait one extra minute to pass on a country road. Do you whine when having to wait for tractors, horses or sheep?
The fact of the matter is we desperately need clarification on the issue of riding two abreast on our roads. The Highway Code is clear as mud on this matter and, in my opinion, only serves to support the arguments on both sides of the debate, rather than providing clear guidance on how and where it is appropriate to ride two abreast.
The highway code to a policeman should be the same as 'the knowledge' is to a cabbie ...
Agree. It's not difficult. There are pictures in there and everything.
Hmm - shouldn't a cabbie know the highway code, too? Or is that too much to ask?
1 of the worst incidents of unnecessary close overtake by a car was a police motorway patrol car just a mile or so from its base, passing our club ride on a wide empty road and nearly removing the front 2 rows of the group. Needless to say he didn't stop despite all of us noisily raising alarm and simultaneously giving him gestures of our appreciation... I was quite looking forward to him/her stopping to discuss our feedback.
What foul snobbery. By all means criticise this poor police officer but to question the intelligence and education of all officers tells us more about you then them. For what it is worth, new recruits must now have A levels.
Agree. Some of the responses on this totally undermine any credibility the authors might think they have.
And there is a concern about a "them and us" situation?
This kind of thing gets me so annoyed, I really do hope you make then think about their behaviour when you complain.
I've lost count of the number of times I've encountered this from tw@ts in cars - you shouldn't have to put up with that attitude from the general public let alone the police. At least with the public you can abuse them back!
Good luck with the IPCC
Could carry and share one of these:
http://julesprichards.wordpress.com/2011/11/02/lifes-too-short-to-finish...
...but then again, I have found that it's pointless - idiots win, cyclists get injured (or killed).
What hope is there when the law's bent.
Not 100% how in date this is:
http://www.ldcdownloads.co.uk/pdfs/highwaycode.pdf
mad_scot beat me to it. There have to be regulations somewhere online, I've got a copy of my city's bike law pamphlet on my smartphone.
Looking forward to seeing the IPCC response. It's coming to the point where if I have to deal with any security/police/etc I note names and numbers before starting to talk to them...
I was stopped there a couple of years ago, for having fog lights on. I had just come down the hill (the top of which was foggy). They park in the car park at Outside looking for someone to pull fo the slightest thing - real hearts and minds stuff.
PC Sadsack put the full blues on and tried to give me the hairdryer treatment. I'm hardly a boy racer - sensible saloon - just had not turned th lights off.
I found him aggressive and patronising, and i say this as an police officer myself.
Maybe it was the same guy, maybe he was bullied as child and his wife's getting it from the neighbour.
"All he has to say to justify his actions is that he is of the opinion the road was narrow. I suspect your complaint will fall on deaf ears."
I fear that you could well be correct netclectic. Although the road is fairly major, two seperated lanes with a broken white line. If he'd quoted the code and told us that he percieved our behaviour as in conflict with it, we would have had a different situation.
Our main objection is to the manor in which he conducted himself, followed by the crash and death example that he blamed on a cyclist to bolster his point. He had a very 'them and us' attitude and was standing behind the 'cars have priority' argument. Just not right.
Pulled by the fuzz, that's gotta hurt ..
I was swung round by the t1ts once, that was murder ..
AN OLDIE BUT A GOODIE EH..
Pages