In an interview with the Times, “Victoria Pendleton has a sharp warning for drivers who tear past cyclists at close quarters – watch out, you might kill a British Olympic medallist.”
“For starters, many motorists could at least stop being offensive as well as dangerous, says Pendleton. I have to train on the road daily. It’s crucial for endurance work. But the abuse I get from drivers … ‘Get off the effing road’, and ‘Buy an effing car’, are typical. I’m usually dressed in the Team GB kit, but drivers take no notice of that.”
“It does my head in that people have no regard for my safety. If someone cuts me up, I will sometimes catch up and have a go at them. It’s not like their journeys are so important. They’re usually off to the shops to waste some more money. Honestly, what’s a few seconds in their pointless life for the sake of not killing me?”
“Her fears are sadly justified. Her British teammate and fellow Manchester cyclist, Emma Davies-Jones, was left with a broken back after being knocked off her bike on the way to train at the city’s Velodrome in 2005.”
You’ll have read very similar comments on this blog. Everybody loved the Olympic cycling on the TV this summer but will it change anyone’s attitude to us cyclists? Or do I still have to look forward to the broken bones that I’m bound to receive from an ignorant motorist? Club mates have been smashed up after being clipped by cars, yet sometimeshttp://simbryo.stanford.edu the driver neither noticed or stopped. Or cared.
Read the full article on the Times online.
