Along with cyclists not paying road tax and always jumping red lights, one common misconception held by many motorists is that it is illegal to ride two abreast.
It isn’t, and when riding in groups is safer when it comes to drivers overtaking, as explained by Chris Boardman in this video.
Today’s video in our Near Miss of the Day series shows the driver of a Land Rover encountering a group of four cyclists on the road, intimidating the rear pair suffieciently that they switched to single file for their own safety.
It was filmed by road.cc reader James who told us: “Although I shot this over a year ago, I still cannot believe how bad this was.
]”We were cycling in a two by two formation, the rear two then went in single file due to how close the driver was getting to them.
“If you look at the car coming in the opposite direction, it was forced to slow right down to avoid a head on collision.”
> Near Miss of the Day turns 100 – Why do we do the feature and what have we learnt from it?
Over the years road.cc has reported on literally hundreds of close passes and near misses involving badly driven vehicles from every corner of the country – so many, in fact, that we’ve decided to turn the phenomenon into a regular feature on the site. One day hopefully we will run out of close passes and near misses to report on, but until that happy day arrives, Near Miss of the Day will keep rolling on.
If you’ve caught on camera a close encounter of the uncomfortable kind with another road user that you’d like to share with the wider cycling community please send it to us at info@road.cc">info@road.cc or send us a message via the road.cc Facebook page.
If the video is on YouTube, please send us a link, if not we can add any footage you supply to our YouTube channel as an unlisted video (so it won’t show up on searches).
Please also let us know whether you contacted the police and if so what their reaction was, as well as the reaction of the vehicle operator if it was a bus, lorry or van with company markings etc.
> What to do if you capture a near miss or close pass (or worse) on camera while cycling
24 thoughts on “Near Miss of the Day 193: Close pass driver forces cyclists riding two abreast to switch to single file”
Should have been reported to
Should have been reported to the police
One of the ironies here is P1
One of the ironies here is P1 BRP taking up as much or more road space for one person, as the four people riding bikes.
Where I live, most people need to drive short distances around town in a farm vehicle.
When they say riding two
When they say riding two abreast is safer, it doesn’t mean wobbling all over the road and taking up the space of four riders. The group should have singled out anyway once they were aware of the car.
Philatlondon wrote:
Why should they have singled out when there was a car behind?
1) the default road position for a cyclist is to take the lane (i.e. where the outside position is when riding two abreast)
2) it’s easier and safer for all concerned if the riders remain in a 2 abreast pattern, as it reduces the overtaking duration.
Philatlondon wrote:
I’m not sure how four riders aren’t supposed to take up the space of four riders but well done on your first post.
Philatlondon wrote:
Love the logical post there. By the way, you might like to check the Highway Code section 163 which has a beautiful picture clearly illustrating where the Range Rover should have been positioned during the overtake.
Clear yet?
grumpyoldcyclist wrote:
Ah hello Highway Code Rule 163 my old friend
Philatlondon wrote:
1 (ignorant) post, seems legit.
Should they have been riding like this?
Philatlondon wrote:
s/double post//
Philatlondon wrote:
Any reason why they should have done that, besides protecting the Range Rover driver’s fragile ego?
Philatlondon wrote:
If anything this video demonstrates very nicely why riding 2 abreast as a small group is safer. By yielding primary the car driver has simply taken the opportunity to squeeze up alongside adding to the risk for the cyclists.
It really is not difficult. On a road such as this, if it is not safe and clear to overtake 2 cyclists abreast then it is not safe and clear to squeeze past a longer single file of cyclists.
HTH
Mungecrundle wrote:
If anything this video demonstrates very nicely why riding 2 abreast as a small group is safer. By yielding primary the car driver has simply taken the opportunity to squeeze up alongside adding to the risk for the cyclists.
It really is not difficult. On a road such as this, if it is not safe and clear to overtake 2 cyclists abreast then it is not safe and clear to squeeze past a longer single file of cyclists.
HTH— Philatlondon
Exactly (Mungecrundle)…before the roundabout even in single file the road is too narrow to safely pass without a vehicle moving completely across the centre line – passing in the roundabout was a no-no, driver had no idea what line the cyclists would take was too close and then ended up beside 2 of them and could only pass the two in front after a car coming the other way stops so the driver can finish what was an ill thought out and dangerous manoevre (see the cyclist signal thank you to the now stationary on comingcar) – at this point braking and waiting was the only safe option for the Range Rover driver (safe for others that is) but I guess the hospital was short of a brain surgeon and somone had to get there in a hurry
Philatlondon wrote:
Please, get back to the Daily Mail. You’ll just make a fool of yourself here.
Philatlondon wrote:
The way that the driver
The way that the driver maintained close proximity alongside the cyclists merited reporting to the police IMO. Whether the police would have done anything… What I tend to do is separate to single file but then keep pretty much the same road position, as if riding on the outside of a two abreast formation, to reduce the chance of a close pass. Had an overtaking motorist hoot us on a totally clear, and straight B-road when we were two abreast.
dassie wrote:
That’s called riding in primary position (i guess where the second outside rider would be), or colloquially taking the lane. It’s the default road position for a cyclist
dassie wrote:
Police won’t do shit, I got pulled out on at a roundabout yesterday and then the driver starting shouting abuse out the window, I caught sight of a police car not 5 seconds later at the junction from where the (closed) station is located, pointed at the van and said he’d just missed me by inches and had started swearing and shouting abuse which is a public order offence. The van was two cars ahead, she pulled off in that direction but I noticed didn’t follow, instead she pulled into the petrol station (not for fuel) and thought I hadn’t seen her just park up and absolved herself of her sworn oath to keep the peace.
I was going to approach her to ask why she refused to speak to the dangerous driver in the white van but just slowly passed and shook my head, I doubt she even took it on board that she is part of the problem!
This is what it has come to, people just don’t bother because the police don’t give a fuck for the most part. I bet if I was a women on foot and said he’d just swung a sledgehammer near my head and then started searing at me she’d have the blues and two’s on straight away.
Nothing surprises me anymore
Nothing surprises me anymore ref c*ck motorists. 28km return from work today; all on bike paths apart from the last 3km. 5 near-misses/aggressive actions in that 3km; quite depressing.
Shades wrote:
Same in my neck of the woods. The last couple of km of my daily route has a crap cycle path, which is usually full of rubbish bags, pedestrians and cars, so I don’t ride in it. It’s also largely flat/downhill, so easy to maintain 35+km/h. Every single day, I get some prick tooting their horn and shouting abuse out of their window. “We spent 20 million quid on this bike lane for you lot”, “Get in the bloody cycle lane, it was built for you” etc… of course all are livid that they have probably been made to slow down by, I dunno, 5 or 10km/h for a short distance before reaching the next set of lights.
I’ve no idea how these hair-trigger angry twats deal with the real inconveniences that life throws at them.
I am a keen driver as well as
I am a keen driver as well as cyclist, and I just don’t get why other drivers find it such a difficult concept to grasp that if its not possible to pass a pair of riders two abreast, then it would most likely not be safe enough to pass two riders single file.
I often wonder if these people would walk up behind couples strolling along on pavements and yell ‘walk in single file!’ before barging past. No, because they’d get a punch in the face, and rightly so.
PRSboy wrote:
You’ve clearly never done a walk to school on narrow pavements. More jockeying for position and elbows out than a Crit race. Need a decent leadout man (buggies quite useful)
I know people are busy and its stressful getting Tarquin & Mimsy to school but it’s the post-dropoff behaviour I find bizarre. I have a regular route past one of the local schools (single carriageway, no centre line, very rural but perfectly wide enough for 2 Range Rovers to pass each other at a reasonable speed) and the driving standards are appalling – to the point that I’ll time the ride to pass by around 5 mins after the bell has gone.
Ah, personal plates, innit?
Ah, personal plates, innit?
Always a reasonable indicator of narcissistic entitled sociopaths
The more miles i do by bike
Whoops…
They don’t look like
They don’t look like commuters.