Apologies to Mr Black Audi A5 driver yesterday

[Regiment]

I just wanted to post this, just in case you're on here, that i do apologise for pulling out in front of you whilst you were travelling on Lane 3 of the M1 near Leicester yesterday morning during rush hour. I did mirror signal and manoeuvre as i was travelling at 70mph but due to the massive speed difference between myself and you, i can only guess you were doing at least 100mph+ with how quickly you caught up to me doing 70mph and the cars around me doing around 80mph, that the small amount of time between me checking my mirror and starting the manoeuvre, you had travelled a lot further than i had anticipated.

I can only say that an accident was only averted by my quick thinking but i just wasn't aware that anyone would be travelling that fast on the M1 in heavy traffic during rush hour, especially when we had only just come out of a 40mph 'Caution Queue' sector and was just about to enter a 50mph sector with road works.

I hope you can forgive me for my driving,

Yours Sincerely
Mr Blue Clio driver.

[Dan_1981]

I'll go first....

Why were you pulling into the outside lane if the vehicles around you were doing 80 and you were doing 70?




I have a feeling this thread will not go as planned.

[mrdemon]

"I did mirror signal and manoeuvre "

that's the issue, people think they have the right of way after they signal and just move out, in future take more notice ;-)

what are you going to do on the next euro visit where cars can be doing 170mph.

here is the key issue of your post

"but i just wasn't aware "

[LA167]

Dan_1981 said:

I have a feeling this thread will not go as planned.

I'll second that, sounds like better judgement needed on your part really.

[markmullen]

So you weren't sufficiently aware of surrounding traffic, pulled out into the path of an approaching vehicle?

Good work OP.

You need to work on your awareness.

This thread won't go the way you were hoping

[EskimoArapaho]

I was taught: Mirror, Signal, Mirror, Manouevre (specifically for this sort of reason).

Typical Clio driver, though.

[jayemm89]

This is why I prefer the Autobahns - everyone is generally aware that traffic in the outside lane could be doing 150+.

I guess this is a fairly common case of the OP expecting a road user to be driving in the same manner they would be driving. That'll never end well.

[Busso GTA]

Having to travel the M62 daily it seems people believe the indicator is some divine right to move into a lane and bugger to whether it is actually a safe maneuver or not

[CatfishCKY]

I will don my flameproof jacket just in case, but surely it would be more the Audi at fault? Yes OK the OP could have repeated the M,S,M manoeuvre if he was uncertain of the Audi's closing speed; however surely the Audi driver shouldn't have been going so fast if the road was as busy as the OP says?
I could be wrong and may have misinterpreted what OP is saying, but that is how I understood it.

[Nors]

Come on folks, the OP has 'appologised'!

[andrewrob]

I always look twice, one quick glance in the mirror doesn't give you an idea of their closing speed.
Mirror, signal, mirror, maneuver.

[thatdude]

Well, I'll jump in and side with OP here...He pulled into the lane at 70 mph, perhaps wanting to overtake people doing 60 mph or slower. So that's his right. Maybe he saw the gap was large from the car that just overtook him doing 80 and the audi in question. But sometimes it;s hard to judge speed from a vibrating mirror and a short look (a proper look but it's never long enough unless you really look for quite some time). Maybe Mr Audi was doing 80 mph, then just booted it (I'm going to say it was a TDi and he felt like cleaning out his DPF).

So Anyway, OP has admitted he made a mistake (very rare for someone to hold their hands up these days, we're all driving gods and everyone else is wrong wrong wrong) and whilst calling into question the speed of the audi driver, admits he himself would have been at some fault if there had been a collision

p.s. ladies and ladies, dont forget to check over your shoulders in that blind spot. Very rarely will you find something there, but when you do you'll be glad for the habit

[hotchy]

So you pulled out on a guy going faster than you? Even at 100mph he must of been close in your mirror before pulling out.

[EskimoArapaho]

thatdude said:

So Anyway, OP has admitted he made a mistake (very rare for someone to hold their hands up these days,

I think if you look closer, you'll see that the word 'Sincerely' is finely honed from pure sarcasm.

[Regiment]

Dan_1981 said:

I'll go first....

Why were you pulling into the outside lane if the vehicles around you were doing 80 and you were doing 70?




I have a feeling this thread will not go as planned.

A car in lane 1 was indicating to move over to the position that i was in in lane 2 so i allowed the car in lane 3 to pass me that was doing around 80, and then moved out but as i moved out into lane 3 saw that the Audi was going very, very quickly so had to try to brake and pull back into lane 2 behind the car that was in lane 1 that had started moving over to lane 2. I never fully entered lane 3 as after i mirrored, signalled and started manuoveuring, i checked my mirror again.

And yes, i am aware it was 99% my fault, i do generally drive properly believing that every other road user is an inept idiot that i have to compensate for but i had a momentary lapse of judgement and expected my fellow drivers to be as good as me.

hotchy said:

So you pulled out on a guy going faster than you? Even at 100mph he must of been close in your mirror before pulling out.

The first time i checked the mirror, he was a good 50 yards or so back, a second later when i started changing lanes and checked the mirror again, he was only around 20 yards back. With everyone pootling along at 60mph generally and going with the flow of the traffic and the average "german saloon" driver now overtaking at 80mph, i wasn't expecting someone to be going as quickly as Mr Black Audi with the level of traffic that was around. But yes, it was my mistake for moving out and i did check the mirror again as i started the lane change, i just didn't expect in the short amount of time between both mirror checks, for him to have caught up as much as he did which meant i had to squeeze back into lane 2 and he had to brake hard.

Edited by Regiment on Thursday 3rd April 12:26

[dkatwa]

Couple of boy racers (Z4 and SLK) overtook me at 120+ yesterday just after the Forth Bridge, heading West. Almost caught me off guard, even though I regularly check my mirrors. No need for that kind of speed on public roads..save it for the race track....
Still, the BMW was ahead :-)

[StottyEvo]

Last year I was in the passenger seat of a car, the driver indicated and moved into L2 on a dual carriageway then an aggressively swerved back into L1, got a tank slapper on and hit the central reservation at 60 writing the car off.

She swerved back as an Evo was approaching at ~120 and she couldn't judge the closing speed.

I honestly think the accident was 90% her fault as she clearly didn't check her mirrors correctly.

There I was a "victim" of this situation, and even I think the speeding car wasn't at fault. Its good that you apologised OP

[wibblebrain]

Shouldn't be allowed in the outside lane in a Clio anyway

[Vladimir]

The rant disguised as an apology style never ever works.

[StottyEvo]

dkatwa said:

Couple of boy racers (Z4 and SLK) overtook me at 120+ yesterday just after the Forth Bridge, heading West. Almost caught me off guard, even though I regularly check my mirrors. No need for that kind of speed on public roads..save it for the race track....
Still, the BMW was ahead :-)

Not allowed to race on a track, you'd get black flagged.