watching traffic

[jademe]

New Experience for me recently.

I was returning from great vacation and still a few days away from home. I was on a two lane road in Ontario and the shoulders were gravel. I was meeting a string of cars and fortunately I was the only one headed my direction. I kept a watch on the traffic coming my way which I try to always watch. Suddenly from the back of about six or seven cars a motorcycle jumped out into my lane and came right at me. I had no where to go except to hug the white line to my right. He blew past me at "passing speed" and managed to wave at me at !! It appeared as though he was very comfortable (and familiar ?) with this style of riding. It was over in a split second but the thoughts of what could have happened have haunted me ever since. There are too many options for how this could have turned way too ugly. I am just thankful that I was paying attention, was able to respond and that my "angel" was with me.

 

 

[Danny caddyshack Noonan]

You should have immediately gone to an Italian restaurant and enjoyed some of his kin....Calamari. That was an inane move for him. He assumed you wouldn't need to change lane position along with a million other things.

[Quinn]

I would probably have already been over toward the right side of my lane expecting someone to poke their nose out to see if they had a chance of passing. Guess he would have taken that as permission to try his luck with me as well.

 

---

 

 

[ShovelStrokeEd]

Me too. Any time I see a line of cars approaching on a 2 lane I kinda expect one of the trail cars to at least take a peek. A motorcycle really wouldn't bother me all that much. Typical lane width=12 feet, typical MC width < 3 feet. That leaves of 6 feet to play with.

[tallman]

I commute going against the grain.

98% or more going other direction.

Conventional wisdom advocates riding in L wheel track.

However in these situations I stay well to the right.

Geometry sez those peekers will see me much earlier that way.

No, I'm not surrendering my lane by being over to the right, I'm exercising good lane position to maximize my reaction time.

Now, when I catch up to a vehicle in front of me I will move to the left to give myself a better view of the road and increase the chances that any peekers or passers will see that there is a vehicle behind the car/truck I'm following.

 

To OP, if no one was behind you, the other bike made a move based on that and the choice was a poor one, IMO.

Yes, there was room, but that doesn't make it OK.

[Survived-til-now]

I'm kinda with ShovelstrokeEd on this.... if the road is wide enough it doesn't phase me too much either. If I see a bike coming up behind a line of cars I'll sometimes move over to the side so he can see I have seen him and go if he wants.

 

It's a bit of risk though - he is relying on you looking at where you are going and if you are not paying attention, fiddling with the GPS/radio, looking the map, chatting to the pillion, pointing out the pretty mountains etc etc then your inattention could take both of you out. Lucky for him you were paying attention.

 

Not sure I'd want to rely on the other guy that much if he hadn't shown me he was looking