Advanced Rider Course

Physically look behind? Like a life saver on overtakes on mway you mean?

 

Before taking advanced training, I thought I had decent throttle control from track days and dirt biking. However, I found the "optimising speed" challenge you described (and overcoming it) improved my throttle control significantly. Now I can judge my speed – while also knowing my revs and gear – highly accurately, with no need to look at the TFT display. My throttle control is also smoother.

While it was a minor part of advanced training, better throttle control and improved 'sense of speed' have made my riding more satisfying (more fun).

 

I started doing my IAM after signing up at the NEC bike show.

I’ve generally enjoyed it but couldn’t bond with the first observer I went out with. I did three rides with him and just got more and more frustrated. He didn’t offer advice just criticism and kept telling me to read Roadcraft. One thing that really drove me crazy was we were out in the pouring rain and I was avoiding manhole covers, he told me I was ‘compromising my lines’ and should have just ridden over them. This just felt wrong to me. He was also obsessed about not using the brakes.

I spoke to the group organiser and went out with him a couple of times and then another observer which has been much better. (He also disagreed with some of the ‘advice’ I’d been given)

Should be taking my test fairly soon just need to do a mock test first but it’s been hard with lockdown etc to get the course completed.

 

Unfortunately you came upon an unsuitable observer. Not one to make judgements, but one of the GOLDEN rules of riding is never sacrifice you safety for positioning. That observer is 100% wrong here and needs to be taken up on it by someone appropriate.

 

I’ve now done 2 sessions and have learnt a fair bit. Road positioning is what I have to work on ,and by this I mean exactly what has been said above. Never sacrifice road positioning for safety. Sounds simple enough , but being aware of every single possible hazard and effective safe position for this takes some retuning of the brain. So worthwhile for me so far.
And having someone positively picking holes in your riding is a big plus. As we are all guilty at times of thinking we don’t need to change how we ride. Habit can bring on complacency I think.

 

His reasoning when I questioned it was ‘bike tyres are so good now riding over a manhole cover wouldn’t cause a problem’

 

Never sacrifice safety for road position.

 

Sound a polite vest wearing prat.

 

I done it and fell off.

 

You can always ask the group (e.g. the chief observer or membership secretary) to allocate you another observer. I did. It was surprisingly straightforward to swap to an alternative observer, and I'm glad I asked. I guess IAM groups realise there's no guarantee that any two people will gel. And the group would prefer you stuck with it (and pass your test) than lose you because your observer wasn't the right fit.

Also, I disagree with your observer's manhole cover advice. I avoid wet manhole covers.

 

Ex-IAM Chief Observer and National Observer here. Sounds like you were right to request a different Observer. He does sound like a bit of a lemon from his criticism and behaviour. Unfortunately, there is a huge difference in the level of IAM group quality and Observers, though it is getting better now that there is standard IMI accreditation (since it was changed to IAM RoadSmart). I firmly believe things will get even better as time goes on. Don't forget that Observers are only volunteers, and some of them are accredited because they pass the test but then go on to (for their own reasons) stray from the path too much.

What he probably meant (but failed to make clear) was that you shouldn't change a safe position on the road in order to avoid a manhole IF doing so would place you in jeopardy. Ideally you should ride so that using good observation naturally gives you a safe line that avoids them anyway, without having to make last second changes to swerve around them. Use of brakes naturally decreases with proper speed, gear selection and acceleration sense but, again, it sounds like he failed to explain properly. Everything goes back to IPSGA - it's Position for the hazard, then Speed for the hazard, then Gear for the speed IN THAT ORDER for a reason. IAM stuff is based on Police Roadcraft, but he should have been teaching the IAM syllabus and really shouldn't have been lazily pointing you to Roadcraft (which is a great thing (after the IAM test) but the IAM stuff is the only stuff Observers are actually qualified to explain - this is from Robbie Downing who is one of the very senior IAM training officers and a Police biker, who I met when he passed me as a National Observer).

There is nothing inherently dangerous about wet manhole covers/pools of diesel/wet white lines, etc. This can easily be proven by physics (and practically) by taking a push bike, setting it upright and pushing it (with no rider) so that it goes over a manhole/through a pool of diesel on its own - the bike will quite happily come out upright on the other side (this also happens to be true if the bike it at an angle of lean, but I digress). If you ride a bike upright and straight over them with a very light touch on the handlebars and don't make inputs to the bars out of panic, your bike will go straight over all of them. You may not like it while it's doing it, and the bike may even slip/slide a little, but as long as you stay calm and collected, and don't make any inputs to the bars, the gyroscopic forces of the bike will keep it shiny side up. Hell, I've ridden no-handed, with not a care in the world, over scaffolding boards at 50 mph (not on public roads, of course) to prove what a bike can do to stabilise itself.

 

I can agree with all these points and perhaps that's what he was trying to say about manholes. I'm of an age when bike tyres were considerably less effective in the wet, on diesel, white lines and manhole covers so perhaps I'm preprogrammed to avoid them.

Modern tyres are a lot better and as you say riding straight and level will probably not cause an issue for the rider on most occasions.

I'm still enjoying my training and hopefully will continue to do so

 

So, potholes, kerbs and stuff. I'm sure it's no urban legend that all the potholes are accelerating suspension failure. But I saw a presentation - in the late '70s - by a guy from Michelin, during which he showed x-ray pictures of damage to tyres caused simply from riding up kerbs. No matter the improvement in tyre technology since, I doubt riding over potholes doesn't weaken their structure.

I was stopped by the police, once, 30 years ago, for weaving, on a road notorious for potholes. I said "I'm avoiding potholes, because they damage the tyres and suspension". He told me to stop doing it.

I also got stopped because I kept looking over my shoulder.

The irony being that the 'lifesaver' was a term, as I understand it, coined by the police.

 

Hope it all goes well. Andy

 

Well done. Andy