Puff The Magic Wagon!

iTrader: (2)

M11 delays/chaos due to overturned lorry @ the M25, so decide to go Whipps Cross, Buckhurst Hill, Loughton, Epping, Harlow & onto M11 up there.

Coming out of Buckhurst Hill, there is a long straight bit of road after the 40 ends & NSL begins. I was behind 2 cars who themselves were behind a coughing diesel pickup doing about 40. I saw that after the oncoming cars had passed it was clear enough for me to overtake all three without problem (& exceeding speed limit), so as soon as last car went past, I was indicating, moving out and overtaking the first of the three.

Imagine my surprise/horror when without indicating/speeding up or otherwise looking to have intentions to overtake, the middle car (an A series Merc), when the front of my car is just about level with his rear quarter, suddenly swerves out in front of me and hits his horn It was quite obvious to me that he was objecting to my overtaking and pushed himself out to make it hard for me to overtake as he made no attempt to accelerate.

At this point I may have been doing as much as 55 mph. I had to swerve right across and over the white lines on the side of the road to avoid him. If there had been an oncoming car, it could have seriously put me in danger. Having the benefit of road presence (large Volvo) I carried through and the other driver backed off, so I pulled in front of him and gently braked to a complete stop.

OK not the cleverest thing due to cars following but short of ramming the prat off the road not a great deal else could do. I sat there for about 10 seconds during which there was no horn, no flashing form dip-weed, then moved off - to me a sign that he was bricking himself incase I got out and clumped him. When I moved off he hit the main beams

In all my years of driving, I've had people close gaps on me etc but never ever have I seen someone deliberately swerve out in front of me because I was legally overtaking them.

Unbelievable

CooperS

People don't like being overtaken these days, sad really, I perform many safe overtaking manouvers only to be given a flash of lights, wnakers!!

richieh

happens quite often when i'm on the bike i find
sad really
richie

J4CKO

iTrader: (1)

Yep see it all the time, they cant cope with somebody going past them even though they arent prepared to get a fast enough car to pull off an overtake, or the other ones where you overtake and because you are on their side of the road coming towards them they decide to start flashing, durr like I was going to overtake and smash into you, especially true with bikers overtaking and then getting some road captain getting all irate cos he is within a mile and has no concept of accelleration aboe what his car is capable of.

Scooby.Newbie

Must be the weather, had the same thing just two days ago coming home from Bristol (back to Dorset) over took two cars and was just going past the third (and last in the line) and he swayed out into the middle of the road, not sure if it was in protest or ignorance but made me check and think about whether I should pull in or swerve and go for it, I did the latter, the road was clear and it was more than safe for me to do so, and he never gave me a sidewards glance, out of shame i would like to think.

Scooby.Newbie

double post, sorry.

Spoon

What biscuits were they?

Bubba po

Lemon Puffs.

Spoon

You were in the Merc?

Bubba po

Yep. My names Gary, and i'm a baldy.

Spoon

That's Rich Tea coming from you.

Bubba po

It comes from hob-nobbing with this lot.

Spoon

Nice

carl

Personally I think you're morally obliged to let the people in front have a go at overtaking first. If you're sure they're not going to do so (e.g. by observation at previous overtaking opportunities) then have a go yourself.

You have to remember that not everyone plans ahead. So you, three cars back, may be waiting for an opportunity to pass, see the gap coming, get into the correct gear, etc., then go for the overtake as soon as the opportunity comes. Meanwhile, numpty driver ahead takes several seconds to realize the road is clear, starts an overtake without looking in his rear view mirror, then finds someone with a load of momentum right up his ****. I know he's in the wrong, but being in the right doesn't stop you getting killed.

So personally I would make sure that no-one else was going to try to overtake before commencing. Of course, if the idiot numpty deliberately tries to drive you off the road there's nothing you can do really.

Vegescoob

Perhaps the Volvo was the problem?
Tradition has it that Volvos are the ones sedately holding others up.

Lee247

Vegescoob, where have you been

Fuzz

you sound as shocked as I did this morning when, backing out of my drive, I find my Auntie and uncle out next to the road with a ******* speed gun, lent to them by the Parish council. (we live out in the country on a 50 limit, used to be a 60).
I leaned out the window and said "Haven't you got anything ******* better to do."
God squad didn't like that at all.


Andy

unclebuck

Should have floored it past him then slammed the brakes on!! That would point out that you have an 'issue' with his conduct.

tath

I've developed the above enraged habit I'm ashamed to say... Generally when dealing with overwhelming ignorance I try to fight back with my own

Adidas

Puff,

I know that peice of road very well, in fact I was driving along it about 20 minutes ago

Problem is, as you're probably aware, the local authority cut the NSL part by half last year, and stuck in the 40 mph. They then painted those stupid traffic islands by the car park, thus in a stroke have taken away most overtaking opportunities. I think by doing that other drivers tend to panic because it is such a straight peice of road and often they see cars coming down from the roundabout and feel that a head on is inevitable.

I have seen some mad bits of driving along there, normally by the nutter bikers on the way back from the Green Hut. Mind you some bloke years ago put his Corvette into the forest on that stretch of road at well over 100mph. Needless to say he was never able to brag about it

Richard_P

I've been driving a slow ****box while mine is getting repaired and I've been letting people pass quite happily where I have no chance of and overtake (most of the time!).

Car hero's, worse than keyboard hero's even!!!

OllyK

Was out in the misses' bus at the weekend, went to overtake a car and realised there was just no pick up what-so-ever. I resigned myself to not overtaking for the day and made sure there was plenty of gap between me and the vehicle in front for anybody wanting to pass to be able to hop in to.

Puff The Magic Wagon!

iTrader: (2)

Well I sort of did as I swerved round the front & brought him (+ all the cars behind) gently to a full stop in the middle of the road...

The Zohan

Good call Puff FWIW i would have done the same. This chap in the a class sounds like a menace on the road and what he did was stupid and could have caused fatalities if there was oncoming traffic or you had lost control.

Leslie

About the best you could do PTMW, sounds like his "issue" was all down to a "systematic" brain fade to put it into modernised language!

I quite like those lemon puffs

Les

carl

It's much more challenging with little power available. You can overtake in anything: it just requires you to plan ahead more. I have to say that people with fast cars often don't know how to overtake by planning ahead: they just rely on the power of the car.

LC Geezer

I'm ashamed to say that I'd have been out of the car and standing on his bonnet

Maz

iTrader: (34)

It's also a lot more dangerous, lack of power or torque equals greater time exposed to danger. I think this prospenity of some people to be intolerable of being overtaken is due to their own insecurity. They think it belittles them in some way,it breaks their own unwritten law thus compelling them to behave in a manner that is completely stark raving loony!

Scoob99

iTrader: (1)

Another berk in a Merc

Dave T-S

James

Spooky - only last week I was on a rural NSL road and came up behind a bus doing 25mph in the 60, with two cars stuck behind it. The rear one was a 1.4 D, so having established he wasn't going to be able to overtake even if he wanted to decided to pick them off one by one as conditions allowed (it's a twisty road). As I got upsides of the 1.4 D he started to drift across me, and I thought he was not concentrating and had just drifted, but then realised he was also blasting his horn at me, so had obviously decided to try and force me off the road. I was alongside him and almost past so had nowhere to go but to continue. When I got past him there was not enough clear space to overtake either the other car or the bus so I pulled in (without cutting him up). I then saw he was simultaneously blasting his horn, flashing his lights wildly and gesticulating all sorts of hand signals. I just ignored him.

The next thing he is suddenly right up my bumper, still flashing, horn blasting, gesticulating and now trying to push me into the back of the car in front - and i'm still stuck at 25mph and can't overtake due to double bends.

At this point I thought "i'm not putting up with this" and gave him a brake test

He backs off briefly and then it all started again, the gesticulating, flashing, blasting etc. This time I just stopped and sat there whilst I could see him in my rear view mirror absolutely purple with rage, both hands off the steering wheel still gesticulating wildly.

At this point the car behind him had got fed up with him decided to overtake him, and as the Escort came past him I gave it maximum berries and shot off in front of the Escort, leaving him as a buffer between me and matey

400yds up the road is a straight so I tidied up the other car and the bus and never saw him again

What a d1ckhead - try and kill someone just because they had the audacity to overtake

Oh, did I not mention? It was an A Class......

Silver, 51 (IIRC) plate.

He would have headed from the M11 area, wonder if it was your mate

I have noticed over the last few years there is an increasing tendency to get all sorts of verbal from people when you perform a clean overtake on them, but I don't know why

On a different note, the quad bike is now road legal (well, for a tractor ) so I might pop over on it and see you if you are around at the weekend Better not do it while I have got the shotgun bungeed on the front rack though