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[Costas]

Being involved with motorcycle training especially the last two years I found that close to 60% we do not react appropriately. Training gentlemen is a must,  and we often forget about it.
Even here commenting this video none of the posts is mentioning the wrong full reaction of the motorcyclist, was inteed a clear car drivers mistake and often is, but the reaction is far from the correct one, in fact the motorist was caught clearly completely by surprise. 

[black-k1]

I agree 100% regards training. I've long since thought that, if the government were serious about road safety, they'd make refresher driver training a mandatory feature of keeping a driving license.

I don't agree that the motorcyclist "did the wrong thing". He may not have done "the right thing" given hindsight and the ability to slow-mo the whole sequence but given his view of the unfolding events, the time he had to react and the options open to him, I'm not sure there is actually anything more that could be expected of him.

From his perspective, I suspect he would have established that both/either vehicle stopping "in time" was not going to happen. Likely it would be impossible for him to understand if the car was actually going to tighten up and just make the turn on the correct side of the road or totally over cook it and drift even further the wrong way, thus he had no "safe option" to choose a side. Hitting the brakes as hard as he could was the only option while trying to "buy time" to understand what the best thing to do was.

[gibbo]

Costas and David are right to mention the training aspect, but could the biker have reacted in time to save himself from the awful conclusion? It's debatable. I think we can say the driver of the Saburu was a complete K**b.

 If you look at the position of the biker approaching that right hand bend, he could have been farther over to the left. Also, he could have headed for that ditch on the left. Probably though a case of target fixation and panic.

As for the cyclists, Tom's right to highlight their faults but they're not all like that. After the 2012 Olympics we had a plethora of wannbee Hoys, Wiggins and Trotts clad in lycra adorn the highways and byways. And, the more of them on the roads the more accidents will occur.

I have to say to all cyclists...…………...get yourself insured (like Tom) and wear a helmet. If you seriously injure a pedestrian or worse, then where do you stand legally? You're deep in no man's land that's what.

[black-k1]

Costas and David are right to mention the training aspect, but could the biker have reacted in time to save himself from the awful conclusion? It's debatable. I think we can say the driver of the Saburu was a complete K**b.

 If you look at the position of the biker approaching that right hand bend, he could have been farther over to the left. Also, he could have headed for that ditch on the left. Probably though a case of target fixation and panic.

...

The bike being further left would not, I feel, have helped the situation. The Scooby took all of the bikes lane thus the only "safe" place he could have been, while still on tarmac, was the wrong side of the road. Given the bikers likely view through the bend then the requirement to be right over to the left was reduced as, most likely, he would not have benefited from such positioning to get extra visibility. Especially true if the the left edge of the tarmac was far from perfect.

I think the ditch option is only there because we know the car is not going to continue its "slide right". That's something the rider didn't have time to know. I see no reason for the biker to be especially "worried" about the on-coming car until it's in the bend and drifting to the wrong side of the road. We all "note" on-coming traffic but we all expect it to "do the right thing" unless there is specific reasons to suspect it won't.

Either way, I expect neither the Scooby driver or the bike rider went out that day expecting or wanting to have an accident. I also expect that if there was the option available, both would rewind time and do things differently. The Scooby driver misjudged a situation (and we've ALL done that when enjoying a nice road!!!!) and, on this occasion,  someone else paid a substantial price as a result. It's a sad situation but, making poor judgment calls resulting in others suffering is something individual human beings have been doing since the start of the human race, and will continue to do for as long as we're here. That doesn't make it right, it only makes it inevitable. All I can say is that I'm glad that I'm not in the position of either of these two but am also fully aware that, every time i use a motor vehicle, I am not be immune from appearing in either role.

[Phmode]

When I were a lad and first started cycling and then motorcycling, I was horrified at the number of my acquaintances who were killed or seriously injured on the roads, even way back then. It was so bad that the RAF wouldn't even let apprectices use motorcycles; there was a bridge over the railway on the Locking Moor Road between Weston-Under-Mud and RAF Locking which had claimed no end of blokes.

I decided that if I was ever facing a head-on, I would spring upward off the pegs so I didn't hit the front of the car so low down. Of course, when you are a fit youth and closing speeds were so much lower, such fantasies are easy to imagine, especially for the gymnastically inclined among us who used to hurl ourselves over all sorts of things with gay abandon...but to this day, in my aged mind's eye, when I do that weird visualisation thing so beloved of top sports folks, there I am, springing upward out of harm's way and coolly walking across the roof of the car before landing elegantly on my feet and straightening my underwear 

[Costas]

Ιn lycra to shape their bottoms mainly.
I was European champion at the age of 16 in cycling, and had some terrible crashes, one particularly in Bulgaria where the paramedics arrived completely drunk to the site. Its all about common sense and vigorous training.
Target fixation is the most common mistake we drivers do,  no matters what we drive.