Worried about cycling in London?

Taking some free cycle training sessions can help improve your experience of navigating complex junctions and heavy traffic, but by following some of these tips you can stay safer and confident on the road.

Position

Riding in an assertive position and not in the gutter is one of the most important steps in being safer on your bike.

Ride at least a door’s width away from parked cars, ‘primary’ position, the same distance away from the curb, ‘secondary’ position. Take the lane when passing through road narrowing’s or whenever there wouldn’t be comfortable amount of room for vehicles to pass you. These will give you room to manoeuvre as well as discouraging drivers from overtaking you too closely.

See and be seen

Look, look a lot, not just in front but all around you.

Keeping your head on a swivel will make you more aware of the traffic around you and allow you to anticipate traffic movements. Try to check behind you every ten seconds and never forget to do a shoulder check before you move position.

Be visible to other road traffic whilst cycling and ensuring you ride in an assertive position can help with this, but there are more ways to maintain your visibility. Firstly, if there is a gap between parked cars don’t duck into it, this will immediately make you less visible, keep your line instead.

Be aware of the sight lines of other vehicles, particularly HGVs, if you can’t see the driver, they can’t see you, eye contact is everything!

Communicate

You're better off keeping your hands on the bars surely?

Whilst you could argue that the last point has an element of truth to it there are plenty of good reasons to communicate, and in doing so improve both your safety, the safety of other road users, and improve the image of cyclists as responsible road users. Here are a couple of ways you can do this:

• Look before you signal
• Signal to pedestrians too, not just other road users.
• Give yourself time and signal early.
• Be clear, don’t’ just vaguely gesture at where you’re going.
• Don’t signal whilst turning, do it before.