DataDan
Mama says he's bona fide
Rolling up miles on the odometer is easy enough, but turning those miles into experience that will make you a better rider takes the right attitude and conscientious effort.
Cut off when a car merges into his lane from the right, a rider avoids a crash by swerving left. Afterward, he brags about slapping the driver's mirror as he passed, but he doesn't seem to understand the trajectories and events that led to the close call. What do you suppose will happen next week when he finds himself in the same situation? Most likely, the same thing. Unless, of course, unlucky spacing and timing make a crash unavoidable. This rider may be accumulating miles, but he didn't gain any experience from the incident.
Though this is a hypothetical example drawn from many forum posts over the years, it's easy enough to imagine different situations and events that could have led to the close call:
To get full value from the experience of a close call or unpleasant surprise, you must accept full responsibility for your own safety, regardless of legal fault. That attitude will enable you to see your own errors, others' errors, and the random stuff that puts you at risk, without an emotional reaction that prevents analytical thinking. And after you've identified the error, that same attitude will help you plan tactics to avoid a similar encounter, so next time you'll see it developing and have a plan for getting away from it safely.
Can you think of a close call that you reacted to by getting pissed off, preventing the kind of analysis which, in retrospect, offered a good lesson?
How about a close call that you reacted to in a productive way, enabling you to see beyond your errors or those of another driver and to come away with a good lesson?
Cut off when a car merges into his lane from the right, a rider avoids a crash by swerving left. Afterward, he brags about slapping the driver's mirror as he passed, but he doesn't seem to understand the trajectories and events that led to the close call. What do you suppose will happen next week when he finds himself in the same situation? Most likely, the same thing. Unless, of course, unlucky spacing and timing make a crash unavoidable. This rider may be accumulating miles, but he didn't gain any experience from the incident.
Though this is a hypothetical example drawn from many forum posts over the years, it's easy enough to imagine different situations and events that could have led to the close call:
- The car was merging into traffic from an on-ramp.
- The driver was surprised when traffic ahead slowed suddenly, and he swerved left.
- The driver figured out that he was in an exit-only lane he didn't want to be in.
- The driver was in a hurry to get to the HOV lane.
- The driver had been lane shopping, looking for the elusive "fast" lane.
- The rider was stuck in the car's blind spot.
- The rider was traveling much faster than the car, making it difficult for the driver to have seen him before changing lanes.
- The rider had simultaneously changed lanes from the left.
To get full value from the experience of a close call or unpleasant surprise, you must accept full responsibility for your own safety, regardless of legal fault. That attitude will enable you to see your own errors, others' errors, and the random stuff that puts you at risk, without an emotional reaction that prevents analytical thinking. And after you've identified the error, that same attitude will help you plan tactics to avoid a similar encounter, so next time you'll see it developing and have a plan for getting away from it safely.
Can you think of a close call that you reacted to by getting pissed off, preventing the kind of analysis which, in retrospect, offered a good lesson?
How about a close call that you reacted to in a productive way, enabling you to see beyond your errors or those of another driver and to come away with a good lesson?