Doing Enhance Rider Scheme

[DrSnoosnoo]

So Derbyshire are subsidising the ERS course for those in Derbyshire and neighbouring counties meaning the course will cost me just .... £20.

Going on Sunday to a school in Rotherham to do the classwork for it. We're apparently going to go through lots of things we should be doing/considering/practising etc. We go away to practise what we've been told and go back another day for an assessed ride to pick parts to improve or be told we're up to scratch.

I think that's how it's set up anyway.

Going with the member Willy_Westside on here. We're playing out around Rotherham tomorrow afternoon, I'm on a purple ZZR6 he's on a FZ6S2, giv us a baiker nod if u see us yh.

Will report back on how it goes
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I'm Sam; Northern, Ginger, Lover
Did have: '95 ZZR600 '83 CG125 '97 ZZR1100 '15 Hypermotard 821 SP Do Have: '10 ZX10R

[Matt B]

For £20 it has got to be worth it.

Full report on your new ninja skills awesomeness when completed
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stinkwheel: He had an animated .gif of a cat performing fellatio. It's not socially acceptable. It can have real life adverse effects on other people.

[Willy_westside]

It's not just Derbyshire and Yorkshire either. I'm heading over from Manchester and I've been granted the full subsidy from Derbyshire County Council too. Two days of advanced training for £20. Absolute bargain. You can do the training at places over the country too, they've changed it a bit from when we applied for it. All you do is fill in this form
https://www.saferroadsderbyshire.org.uk/images/Enhanced%20Rider%20Scheme_Application_Feb2015_WEB_tcm28-261625.pdf
Send it off and they will send you a referance number with a list of training facilities. Book with which ever you want (they do charge different prices, sharp rider is the cheapest only paying £20).

[Motorhate]

Bugger. They should do something like this in London
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Current - Harley Davidson FXDB Street Bob | Harley Davidson FLTR Road Glide | Harley Davidson Road King
GONE - Honda CB500 Ratbike | Yamaha FZ750 | Yamaha XVS1100 | Kawasaki VN2000 | Kawasaki ER-6 F | Harley Davidson XL883L Sportster

[Willy_westside]

Motorhate, they have training centres in London that run the same training. You can search for your nearest using this link:
https://www.gov.uk/enhanced-rider-scheme-trainer
My suggestion is to fill in the form I posted earlier and see if they give you the subsidy too. I don't live in one of the regions they list but they gave it to me. Only costs the price of a stamp to send the form off, best case scenario they give it to you, worst case you get a letter back saying no. If they say yes you choose which training centre you go to.

[Beehive Bedlam]

I won't be attending because I am above the course.

[talkToTheHat]

Am doing ERS in south yorkshire this weekend. Is also £20. Because government subsidy. Im sure there was another thread about this. I think it was mentioned that the people the government want on the course don't do it.

[MG]

[b422063]

I've done IAM - Enhanced. It's now lapsed because I got a bit bored of the groups I was involved with. Never saved me a penny from my insurance. Be aware that they will teach you to ride as if you're infallible and it takes a strong character to disagree with them.

Prime example: Never indicate when there's no one around to not see it. My question: What if you've no spotted someone? After all, you're only human. Who does indicating to no-one hurt? Their response: You should have seen them.

Half the assessors are black rat pigs or ex-pigs and constantly pick holes in your riding without ever admitting to doing anything wrong themselves.

[gbrand42]

[talkToTheHat]

I have an ex-biker mate with a tatty mondeo and lazy driving habits. He once heard someone talk for two minutes about 'the advanced test' and now uses his in depth knowledge of this to excuse his bad habits and wonders why I flip out at him.

If I am moving through someone's blind spot and see an indicator, this promts the sounding of the horn, the getting of danger and usually the diffusing of the situation wave.

Crossing all the lines in a spiral roundabout because "is advanced driving fast line innit" is enough to invoke violent tendencies.
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Bandit. does. everything.

[talkToTheHat]

The bcf corner has happened and the general level of maturity has hit penguin jokes and blind dinosaurs.
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Bandit. does. everything.

[Dave500]

[covent.gardens]

[trevor saxe-coburg-gotha]

[DrSnoosnoo]

[talkToTheHat]

Some initial thoughts on the classroom session:

It's quite long, attention spans waver, mine included. There will be some people in the class with opinions and likely vocal about them. One of them is known on here as talktothehat and is probably very annoying.

The extended version of one of the videos they used an an example. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-8J4bev-JOk

Video analysis sessions were some of the best parts of the of the class, very interactive, lots of people had something to contribute, much demonstration of why to do something rather than just being told to do something.

They were glaringly wrong on a few things, mostly minor but irritating things like ECE 22.05 needing a sticker on the helmet (nope, label sewn into strap) and a magic transition speed between countersteering and not counter steering behaviour based on one anecdote of a motogymkana rider on one bike riding a single constant radius curve experiencing tip-in and stand up behaviours (and contradicting previous half of what they'd said previously).

They are claiming that visors need 75% light transmission to be legal as per car windscreens and the practice of wearing a 50% tint E-marked daytime use only visor and carrying a clear visor is illegal. Frowned up, yes. Illegal? Not unless you're lazy enough to to ride at night with the tinted visor. Perhaps better advice would be don't buy a helmet that doesn't have a visor change so easy you can do it with gloves on without removing the helmet (hjc, shark race visors).

They also appear to blinded by the shoei helmets that haven't advanced to the point of dual accreditation flip-fronts or developed sun visors that work better than glasses.

Kind of entertained that they showed a picture of decent cornering lines and then pointed to a section mid-corner when the bike is clearly already turning if it were to follow that line and indeed not run off the road and insisted that was where one countersteered.

Still looking forward to the road ride part of the course as I'm fairly sure general nerdery far exceeds my actually riding talent.

If anything this has convinced me to bite the bullet and discern which of the sheffield and rotherham IAM groups will generate the least mutual dislike.
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Bandit. does. everything.

[DrSnoosnoo]

@ TTTH I think the part about the cornering was them saying, corner but then steer tighter than you were to finish the corner off. I tried it on the way home and I like that version of cornering, though I have to force myself to break my usual habit.

The whole "countersteering" argument is a silly one. People get hung up about it when really, if you weren't countersteering you would be in a hedge. People bicker about when you are or aren't when in reality it doesn't matter and if you know that if you turn right, you push the right bar, that's it.

I liked the IAM woman who was there to see how much more she knew than the instructors. She talked about "The System" like it was religion, when you understand it, it all makes sense. Let Him into your heart and He shall enlighten you. I'm always going to indicate and because I'm indicating, it doesn't mean I'm not looking. Just because I chose not to follow that suggestion, doesn't mean I don't understand, it means I disagree.

I've pretty much decided I won't attempt RoSPA as the guy said they want you to overtake everyone or you'll be marked down and IAM say you FOLLOW THESE RULES OR YOU'RE OUT.
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I'm Sam; Northern, Ginger, Lover
Did have: '95 ZZR600 '83 CG125 '97 ZZR1100 '15 Hypermotard 821 SP Do Have: '10 ZX10R

[talkToTheHat]

Yes, the wasn't she the chair of an all X chromosome MCC? Having stuck my nose into roadcraft, the system appears reasonable. Indicating or lack of is seen as evidence of concious thought and good observation. I'd go with the game theory approach of indicate when you know it is not required, nothing lost, gain imperceptible. Fail to indicate correctly or cancel indicators at correct point, losses are potentially huge.

IIRC the pressure to make progress has officially been withdrawn by IAM.

Yeah, some of the inaccuracies don't matter, particularly when the mitigation method is the same. Open the throttle at any speed and the bike should stand up.

I have to the overtaking part of the class was pretty good. I got over myself and went out on my friend's r1 today. Would have probably have got myself in a mess building up speed before moving out, but feeling pleased with myself after making a handful of short, sharp overtakes that didn't leave me heading towards the next corner faster than I would like.

The line was thereabouts as I was shown on bikesafe. Trying to determine whether or not I'm consciously pushing on a bar a second time to tighten my line or it's tightening due to change in speed. Will get this given practical time most likely. I know i worked at not fifty-pencing corners after being told off for it by my instructor when I had a mod 2 class. Lomng time ago now though...
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Bandit. does. everything.

[defblade]

[Rogerborg]

[DrSnoosnoo]

I thought I would post up about the freebies we got in a goody bag too.

We got a visor cleaner sponge thing with a bag, must be worth at least a fiver. Although on the instructions it specifically mentions my helmet as incompatible since AGV put an Anti-fog coating on the outside of the visor .... grrrr

A trolley coin thing , that isn't JUST a trolley coin. the outer 1mm is silver, then 2 mm in from that is red, then the rest is green. Can you guess what it does? It measures the tread depth of your tyres! Quite smart really.

Got a magazine/paper thing, good way to waste lunch times.

Pen and notepad.

Hi Viz jacket with zip closure, upgrade from my IKEA Velcro that is totally ineffective. I may or may not have took a Medium and a Large example.

Also included was as much tea and coffee as we could drink.
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I'm Sam; Northern, Ginger, Lover
Did have: '95 ZZR600 '83 CG125 '97 ZZR1100 '15 Hypermotard 821 SP Do Have: '10 ZX10R

[talkToTheHat]

Finally been through the goodybag. Another V2 sponge, winning! Buff clone apparently sized for extra-large heads. Trolley coin is ace, measure car tyres on the other side. Not sure if it's as useful as the corroded forged poind coin that vending machines wont accept that got adopted as the trolley coin in my winter trousers. Much leafletty goodness.

The list of all helmets sharp-tested might be handy if I ever succeed in dragging the girlfriend to J&S. Probably more use if you don't have a smartphone and aren't biker sheldon.

What's the orange thing? is it a tankbag cover, rucksack highvis? shower cap?

Many stickers. I think these might be missing the point, as anyone conscientious to apply them already knows what mirrors are. Best applied to smartphones? Only if one is going to grab it out the window, lob it and scarper might be a better course of action?

Perhaps the hivemind should launch a publicity campaign and see if we can get some BCF promo material included in the goodybags. Would piss myself if nobcat stickers were being handed out.

As an aside, marm's site appears to be potatoed.
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Bandit. does. everything.

[Marmalade]

[DrSnoosnoo]

I'm going back this weekend for my assessed ride ...

I hope I get this cert this weekend, my insurance is due 8th May, I'll get to see whether there is an insurance discount for having this.
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I'm Sam; Northern, Ginger, Lover
Did have: '95 ZZR600 '83 CG125 '97 ZZR1100 '15 Hypermotard 821 SP Do Have: '10 ZX10R