Yesterday we joined in the fun at the "Sky Ride".  British Cycling took over the city centre and closed the inner circle of the ring road for a few hours.

Coventry City Centre was alive and buzzing which was really good to be a part of.  The route took in some of the highlights of the City and included a trip through the University.

There were lots of bikey type things to take part in, next time I'll know not to wear my silly clippy cycling shoes as they meant I couldn't have a go on the big air bag jump :(

However, on our 3 mile ride around the route we witnessed four crashes; two of which were pretty serious.  

The first was somebody on a trike, misjudging the width and clipping a barrier with a wheel and being tipped into the road in front of other cyclists.

The second we only saw the aftermath, somebody was lying on the floor with blood pouring from their head (he wasn't wearing a helmet).  A young girl was crying nearby, we assumed she may have been the cause of the guy falling off his bike.  There were lots of children out who didn't really seem to have control over which direction they were going in.  The ring road is deceptively hilly and lots of the kids were fatigued.

The third we only saw the person being put in to the back of an ambulance.

The final one was just a clipping of wheels and somebody falling off, no major damage.

The reason I'm pointing this out though was these all happened on traffic-free roads, where the average speed of the cyclist was less than 10mph.  Yet in only 3 miles there were four crashes.  

Wearing a helmet is necessary whenever you go out on a bike.  I've read lots of things in the media by brain surgeons etc that say a cycle helmet is too flimsy and won't stop any damage from a car, or if you hit the floor at 30mph.  Their idiots.

I'm a confident and reasonably quick cyclist, yet I very rarely get above 30mph, most cycling related falls will happen below 10mph.  Your head hitting a curb at that speed is hard enough to do some serious damage.  As to the car thing, that's a whole different story and one that's been highlighted in the Coventry news last week.

A helmet may help, it may not.  I know some riders who have been lucky, some not so.  The problem is a bigger issue than the helmet and from my point of view down to a lack of courtesy on the road.  Sometimes motorists, sometimes cyclists.

I've had drivers aim at me to try and knock me off my bike for fun, I've had somebody lean out of their window to smack my ass.  I've had friends have punch ups with drivers, this hasn't happened to me yet.

If everyone using the road just had some basic courtesy and actually paid attention to where they were going, too many drivers using their phones for texting (I've seen a couple of cyclist do the same though), we'd have less accidents.

Please gives cyclists space when you overtake them, if it isn't safe to overtake a horse don't overtake a cyclist.

It will cost you an extra few seconds but potentially save someones life.

Darren "not as fast as Wiggo" Checkley