Bikesafe

Hi all,

Did my DAS a few weeks ago have just started riding an mt07. Anyone one here done Bikesafe? Was thinking of booking one local to me in May. I do feel ok when out but would like to improve my confidence and skills (especially cornering). Guess only comes with clocking up more miles.

Cheers.

Excellent course, did mine at Bromley. Some town and countryside riding with two riders and two coppers. Great classroom training and good lunch included. Worth every penny.

I did a similar thing with Essex fire service. Absolutely worth it, good fun and learned loads. No downsides.

Bikesafe is a good first step to becoming an advanced ride either with IAM or ROSPA, I chose the IAM route.

I have been twice at Rockingham,an hour on the road with the Rozzers and 15 mins on track for £35.Bargain.

Cheers guys.

Looking at Birmingham, morning in a classroom then 3 hour observed ride out after lunch. Cost £50. Looks like I'll go for it. Hopefully have more experience by the time it comes round (not till May/June) and good weather!

Do it, mate......we'll worth the £50......

Also worth looking at is BikerDown, run by the Fire and Rescue service......This is more about what to do if you see a biker down......and it's free.....

Bikesafe can be excellent, but do not be persuaded to ride any quicker than your experience allows. We've had a couple of riders on our local one who have crashed while trying to keep up with faster riders. Use it as an opportunity to improve your hazard perception skills and anticipation, rather than improve cornering confidence. There is only so much one can learn in such a short time frame; if you are interested in improving your riding, then IAM, or RosPA, are your best bet. It is highly likely that there will be Police riders involved in local groups and you can spend loads of time picking their brains.

The Bikesafe course I did with Cambridgshire police was three two hours each week classroom instruction then a one hour ride out, in the pouring rain for me, with your very own motorcycle copper. You will learn loads of usefull information like what position you should take up on the road, how to corner safely at speed and filtering thro traffick, at lights, to get you to the front of the que. Well worth the £50 but priceless keep you safe information. Do it!

The Bikesafe course I did with Cambridgshire police was three two hours each week classroom instruction then a one hour ride out, in the pouring rain for me, with your very own motorcycle copper. You will learn loads of usefull information like what position you should take up on the road, how to corner safely at speed and filtering thro traffick, at lights, to get you to the front of the que. Well worth the £50 but priceless keep you safe information. Do it!

I did mine with Cambridgeshire police too........but they did the classroom bit in one hit on a Saturday in the Huntingdon headquarters. ......then an observed ride a few weeks later...... I have a theory.......when they go round the back of the bike to take down the Reg number I'm sure they also check out the chicken strips, and taylor the ride pace accordingly. ......my guy didn't hang around, but someone else who went out at the same time with another police rider had a slightly more sedate pace......

I wasn't that impressed with the bike safe course, it seems fixated on moving to the outer reaches of the corner for better visibility whether you need it or not and crossing the white line on the other side of the road, again for better visibility whether you need it or not. They're also obsessed with cutting the corner, because why turn if you don't have to...???? It's all good in principle, but they want you within the last 12-18 inches of road and yes that's where the road's collapsed, where you'll find raised ironworks and gravel. I couldn't see the benefit at the expense of losing my margin of error, especially at normal road speeds. At higher speeds and whilst "making progress," it's more important. They also seem to want you really close to the centre line where there's traffic, again for better visibility... seemed a bit of a nonsense to me. I got a B grade with some A's. Your lowest grade is your overall mark. The only things they picked me up on is not using enough of the road for better visibility and disjointed riding, i.e. I treated the road in sections, not one fluid bit of tarmac, but I didn't know the roads and there were steep sweeping adverse bends... Seemed a bit unfair to me.

At the price any extra experience is worth it, but assess what they say and only use it if you agree. Make up your own mind...

Police Scotland stopped providing Bikesafe courses which was a bit crap, but I've been to the BikerDown course before and would thoroughly recommend it to all riders. Good common sense advice and really clear instruction and acting out how to tend to someone in the aftermath of a crash. Definitely worth a few hours of your time.