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Has overtaking been made illegal.....

7K views 39 replies 27 participants last post by  MikeWarner 
#1 ·
.... and I've not heard about it? :confused:

Three times now in the last 2 weeks when overtaking a doddler doing 40mph on a 60 mph single carriageway road I've been shown the finger, the 'merchant banker' sign and had a horn blared at me.

In each occassion i've given them plenty of space and in no way was the manouver reckless or dangerous.
 
#5 ·
on another point, i got cut up on a roundabout today when i was driving the work van, the woman wandered over into my lane nearly hitting me so i beeped the horn and then the woman and her male passenger then started shouting abuse at me! im going to get bull bars pikey style on the transit now so i will just let them hit me in future!
 
#6 ·
Its the norm in UK. People dont know how to overtake, and see anyone else passing them as an insult or something. Ive had the horn, lights, finger, and in quite a few cases, twats speeding up or edging out to stop me passing. Stupid ignorant ****s would rather risk an accident than let someone past them.

People just dont care - they are unwilling to make a move themselves, so the attitude seem to be "**** everyone else too" How many times do you see a massive line of cars behind a lorry on an open road? plenty of overtaking oppertunities but no-one does. Plus they all sit so close together its impossible to pass the line a few cars at a time.

I detest driving in the UK. The roads are crap, but thats a tiny part of the problem, the main problem is the inconsiderate, arrogant, ignorant cvnts that use the roads. As soon as Joe Average gets into his little tin box, suddely he is the invincible ruler of his little kingdom and woe-betide anyone who tries to get past him. I dont get it, I really dont understand the mentality. These chuffs wouldnt act like this while walking along the pavement, abusing people walking faster than them or weaving across the pavement to prevent people passing would they? so why the hell do they do so in a car?

**** them all. Im glad I live where I do.
 
#28 ·
Bang on the money. The worse people I've ever known for speeding up or veering over to their right when I went to overtake them were truck drivers, usually when I was driving a 7.5 tonner. I swear you could follow the ****ers for miles and miles at one speed yet the moment I found a clear spot to overtake they'd be up to their tricks.
Queues of traffic behind one slow vehicles is incredibly annoying as you say: it only takes the car behind said slow vehicle to overtake and every ****er could get on their way. I used to try and pick them off one by one or two by two then get past the slow one.
Here's another for you though: have you tried driving a box van or similar down a long straight single carriage road with a few roundabouts on it?
Here's what happens: you overtake some old duffer doing 40mph and settle down to doing 50mph plus. You come to a roundabout, old duffer catches you up and you pull away as quickly as possible. Old duffer has the edge in his car and then overtakes just after the roundabout and then settles down to 40mph again so you are forced to overtake and keep repeating the process until you have to 'accidentally' use both lanes at the roundabout then stay as far to the right of the road as possible to stop the stupid from overtaking you again.

*Edit: here's another: why do dickheads drive right up to a wagon on the inside lane of a motorway then brake like mad, slow down and indicate and wait 27 hours to pull out again? Why don't they just check their ****ing bastard mirrors beforehand as they're getting closer to the wagons, find a gap and pull out safely?
 
#7 ·
i know most people don't understand mirror, signal manouvre (sp)...it's mirror, "there's someone there so i'll just cut them up because my indicators have flashed twice"... manouvre...then call you a w@nker for not moving out of their way quick enough
 
#8 ·
I've had people flash their high beam for 2-3 miles after I've overtaken them - generally they've been doing well below the speed limit but low and behold they find the gas pedal after you've gone round them :rolleyes:

What David said above is too true unfortunately.....

The M1 in a morning is an absolute joy! One particularly pertinant example of the fine and logical driving style particularly adopted by the cretins frequenting this delightful stretch of road is related to the amber flashing signs. Last week it had rained heavily and in places the motorway can have standing water, as I drove home the signs illuminated to say 'Skid Risk. Slow Down 40 mph', pretty reasonable, so what do the stupid ****ers do - and I mean all three lanes, a whole heap of cars - they slam their bloody brakes on :doh:

Oh genius, there is a skid risk, so yeah braking hard is just the right thing to do lmao
 
#9 ·
One day i'm going to be having a really bad day, i'll overtake someone tootling along well under the speed limit for no reason, overtake them and get flashed or beeped, and i'm going to stop in the middle of the road, get out, and ask them what the hell they think they're beeping at me about. Then i'll explain it was a perfectly safe overtaking and how they're causing more of a hazard than i am, so they can **** off.

Then get back in the car, turn off the traction control, and wheel spin off.

When i'm tootling along in the peugeot and someone in a nicer car comes up behind me i'll often move over a bit so they can see ahead of me to overtake. A few years ago i was going down a dual carriageway and saw someone behind me move into the slow lane and there was a bike behind him, he started accelerating towards me and i moved into the slow lane, he flashed his lights at me and put his hand up to thank me as he shot off in the distance very quickly on his very nice bike.
Really not hard to do is it
 
#15 ·
One day i'm going to be having a really bad day, i'll overtake someone tootling along well under the speed limit for no reason, overtake them and get flashed or beeped, and i'm going to stop in the middle of the road, get out, and ask them what the hell they think they're beeping at me about. Then i'll explain it was a perfectly safe overtaking and how they're causing more of a hazard than i am, so they can **** off.

lmaolmaolmao.........been there, done that got the T shirt:D
 
#10 ·
seems to be the norm now then i see :rolleyes:

Like Dave says above i don't understand the mentality. They seem to go out their way to hinder the progress of somebody who simply wants to travel faster than them. Do they do the same when walking along the pavement?
 
#11 ·
Not at the moment, it'll change if the government decide walking is a revenue earner lmao

I think the people we've all come across here are the brain washed idiots that believe everything that is said to them about driving/speed/road safety and are not only unable to think and make decisions for themselves anymore but have actually taken it upon themselves to become "road warriors" where they will enforce their own road agenda.

Not taken the powers that be long to turn a sizable portion of the population into morons eh?
 
#12 ·
it one of my pet hates that, it always happens on country lanes aswell and they have a que of traffic behind them. its the same sort of ****in idiots that sit at 40mph in a nat speed limit zone and then when they hit a 30mph zone they still continue at 40

either that its the woman motorist who sits as far forward to the windscreen and still feeds the wheel
 
#14 ·
to be fair, and i'm not proud of this, but the other day i overtook a guy on dual carriageway as we approached a roundabout, we eventually ended up side by side at the give way lines ( i was in the right hand lane to go right, him in the left to go left i presumed ), then the ****ing idiot pulls infront of me at the giveway lines so he is actually on the roundabout! he then pulls off into the left hand lane, i proceed in the right lane/inside lane to go right onto a single lane with double white lines with a two lanes of traffic coming the other way, i thought nothing more of it..... he then speeds up behind me, hand full on the horn, and swerves around me into the path of on coming traffic, then slams his brakes on! :eek: in reaction i managed to swerve around him to avoid hitting him, then i ripped the bar up, the c-max came to a screeching halt, i flung the door open in rage and got out ( i was so annoyed that he could of hit an oncoming car and wanted to give him a piece of my mind), he then runs up to me shouting abuse, and in defence i left him have one, in all fairness he was still running, so it did hit him very hard, he went down like a sack of cack, then i looked around (tbh it all happpened so fast) to see all the traffic around me had stopped and they were all giving me abuse! at that point it dawned on me what i had done :( still feel bad nearly 3 weeks later.....
 
#18 ·
Totally agree, I overtook some people carrier doing 35-40 in a 60 the other night, totally safe, after a corner, plenty of room / visibility. Went by, pulled in after a safe distance, only to see them flashing full beam at me, continuing as I accelerated to 60 :rolleyes:

Maybe they didn't like Straight-six POWAaa going by their open window? :D

Likewise with the quick car / bike behind you thing. If I'm in a slower vehicle / driving slower and something comes up behind me that will clearly want by, I give them as much room as I can, pulling over, particularly with bikes, as we all know they like to overtake :nod:
 
#20 ·
I had some guy come up behind me in a 40mph zone and i was sitting at 40, he started flashing me and tooting the horn to move out his way, this was on a dual lane road where there are lots of speed cameras, i just slowed down a bit, gave me the vs, big deal i thought you prick. People like that need a good ****ing hiding.
 
#21 ·
Completely agree with dav d. When i drive home or back to camp i have to travel along some country a roads to get back and forth and countless times i end up stuck behind a lorry travelling slowly (obviously not his fault) with a queue of twenty cars behind it. See countless oppurtunities for overtaking that someone in a smart car car could make but they just sit there. Then when i do it, queue the signs and flashes? what is it with people, its like this country is de-evoling.
 
#22 ·
40 mph drivers reeeeeally boil my piss. The amount of times I'll safely overtake someone who is doing 40mph on a clear national speed limit road only to have them 3" from my bumper when the road goes back into a 30 limit. It seems that most people just don't pay any attention when they are driving these days.

I sometimes wish I was actually more confrontational and had the balls to get out my car to people. I tend to always think it's not worth it and assume everyone is a nutter with a baseball bat in their car lmao
 
#26 ·
I sometimes wish I was actually more confrontational and had the balls to get out my car to people. I tend to always think it's not worth it and assume everyone is a nutter with a baseball bat in their car lmao
Your assumption would be correct. With the amount of driving I used to do it was inevitable I would see a broad selection of nut jobs and I did.

I and my wife have both had people jump out of their cars for either no reason or something so hysterically minor (that it would be funny if the situation wasn't so serious) threatening violence. The guy that did it to me was driving a 1.2 Corsa and I was in a Vectra GSi lmao

He was a funking great bodybuilder who cleary had '**** size' issues, I guess the manly way to find out who has the better car is to handbag it on a roundabout :rolleyes::doh:
 
#23 ·
everyday on the way home i have to turn right against the rush hour traffic so i usually have to wait til the lights change to red and then go...the other day some twat looking student inn a metro put his foot down to get through the light after it turnt red and then stopped in front of me so i could not move...by the time he gets out of my way the lights are green for the other way and im now in the path of oncoming cars.....when he was in my way i beeped him and shook my head to let him know what i thought so he replied by calling ME a wanker out of his window...what can you say eh...my hand went on the handle and the door was coming open but my car would have been in a dangerous position so i went on my way,i will see the twat one day thoe and will let him know my feelings by grabbing his throat very hard lol
 
#24 ·
Nothing to do with overtaking, i seem to be the only person here who will let vehicles leaving a petrol station join the queue of traffic in front of me.....the last few times i`ve done it i`ve been subject to a blast on the horn from the vehicle behind me!!
 
#25 ·
This is a good thred!

I drive alot of miles (50k+ pa) so i see alot of crazy stuff on the roads.

The biggest thing that gets to me is people overtaking when they cant actually go anywhere. ie cue of traffic but a gap appears so someone goes for it to be only one car in front but still in the cue. 0 point if you ask me.
 
#30 ·
Many people are ashamed of being overtook or more to the point, can't cope with that level of trauma against their ego.

For many its their choice of car being belittled, others are naturally competitive (despite driving a 1.1 Peugeot etc) + many other reasons. However for me its simply a measure of maturity wether you let someone go & just sit back maintaining your own rhythm or pace of your journey.

Personally, if I'm out to drive quickly (in that mindset) I'll look to pick off & leave behind anything I feel is safe or possible to carry off. If I'm not up for 'caning it' I'd quite happily let anyone or anything through, so long as they aren't the type that will then be holding me up.... I think that its more apparent a driver hasnt an ego problem when its a quicker/bigger car that allows others to carry on past on their own mission & doesn't care for blocking lanes & giving chase.
 
#31 ·
Sounds like you lot would love to drive round the M25 in Monring Rush hour, if you leave more than a 10ft gap between you and the car infront, then the person behind will undertake you and swerve infront, brake hard causing the domino effect back down the motorway.

The fast lane will flow anywhere from 0-50 if your lucky. Due to said dickheads /\
 
#32 ·
Something I've noticed in the last few years.... tailgating seems perfectly acceptable. You are entirely right, its near on impossible to maintain a safe gape upto the car infront before that space gets taken up by some idiot thats come over from another lane only to maintain the same speed. :doh:
 
#34 ·
This is not a new problem, it is all part of the evolution of a new class of 'risk averse' driver. This driver will not take risks himself and regards anyone else taking what he regards as risks near him as putting him at risk and therefore worthy of retaliation. This driver just does not understand that risk is different for different people/vehicle combinations and that what he might regard as high risk another driver may validly decide is low risk.

This is a natural and unavoidable unforeseen development in the society we now live in in the UK where as much risk is being removed from our lives by government, both local and national so is not particularly a political party issue, that believes it knows best.

I am afraid we are all going to have to get used to living and coping with it.

To me the critical thing is the minimisation of 'time exposed to danger', TED, generally the time you are not safely on your side of the road. This was honed whilst driving on those extremely efficient, in terms of road space, 3 lane roads that have now been just about completely roadmarked out of existence. The American car magazine Car and Driver described them as a 'team' road. Once your 'side' was 'in', that is in the middle lane, it could use it at will until the other 'side' took it from you by overtaking themselves. It taught you a lot about risk and TED, very quickly. Those who did not learn died, a kind of natural selection in operation.

Just as in much of the rest of our lives, driving has been dumbed down.
 
#35 ·
Another one which I was reminded about today - why do people always assume when you use your horn it's being used in an aggressive manor.

The purpose of a car's horn is to enable you to alert others to your presence and thus avoid an accident.

I was driving through Tesco's car park earlier when a BMW began to reverse out just as I was about to pass it. He obviously didn't see me and continued. I sounded my horn, not in anger, just to make him realise I was there. When I had passed I parked further up and noticed him driving at pace in my direction (the opposite way to the exit) as he passed he put the window down to call me a "prick" and sped off. I mean wtf.. lmao
 
#37 ·
Personally (dependant on mood and my passengers at the time) I love tailgaters because I just go slower and slower the closer they get. I then like to make the point that I was doing it on purpose if I turn off that particular road by accelerating like a scalded cat onto the road I've turned on to.
Mind you it didn't work last week as I span a couple of times on some diesel and nearly totalled my car.
I'm giving serious consideration to having some stickers made that say 'The closer you get, the slower I go' and sticking them on the back of my cars.
 
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