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news
Horse rider hit by undertaking cyclist during triathlon (source Facebook).JPGPolice probing triathlon cyclist's undertake of horse rider
The horse rider who filmed the moment she was hit by a competitor in yesterday’s Windsor Triathlon who undertook her at speed during the cycling leg of the event has said that police are investigating the incident.
The footage, shot by Facebook user Jennifer Katherine, has been viewed more than 3.8 million times on the social network since being posted yesterday morning.
In a follow-up post, she called for road users to show mutual respect towards each other, adding that the incident is “Under investigation with police” as well as with officials from Human Race, the organisers of the event.
The route of the cycling leg of the event lies entirely within Berkshire, meaning that Thames Valley Police would be the relevant force, and the horse rider was reportedly due to speak officers this afternoon.
Meanwhile yesterday evening, following publication of our original story on the incident, Human Race reiterated on social media that they are conducting a full investigation and that any riders identified through the video will be excluded from future events.
> Video: Horse and rider struck by undertaking cyclist participating in triathlon
They said: “We are in contact with the individual effected by the horrible incident earlier today at Windsor Triathlon. We want to sincerely apologise to her and her poor horse.
“We have convened a senior level committee internally, and along with British Triathlon we will be reviewing the video evidence to identify those involved in this.
“Those at fault will be disqualified and banned from all future Human Race events.
“There will be further ramifications for these people with British Triathlon and potentially further action taken,” they added.
Simon joined road.cc as news editor in 2009 and is now the site’s community editor, acting as a link between the team producing the content and our readers. A law and languages graduate, published translator and former retail analyst, he has reported on issues as diverse as cycling-related court cases, anti-doping investigations, the latest developments in the bike industry and the sport’s biggest races. Now back in London full-time after 15 years living in Oxford and Cambridge, he loves cycling along the Thames but misses having his former riding buddy, Elodie the miniature schnauzer, in the basket in front of him.
Latest Comments
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Apologies if this has already been shared but I came across this heartwarming story on the Beeb over Christmas....
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Aggrieved motorists?...
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Except the accompanying picture features an aluminum frame bike with what is quite obviously mechanical 105 (shifter hoods are enormous and angular...
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The fact that such self driving cars don't BMW/Audi drivers do exist is proof - as if it were needed - that Gods don't exist
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Wouldn't generalisations about generations be, I don't know, "generationalisations"?
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No chance of that ever being a human being.
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Here's my cycling related Christmas gift. Beautiful enamel garage sign to go above my Campagnolo Super Record RS equipped Colnago.
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69 comments
If TVP have time to investigate this, maybe they can "un-file" my recent case where a Porsche driver deliberately rammed me off my bike and then physically assaulted me... Apparently they cannot locate the vehicle or vehicle keeper, even though they have the driver's description, reg number and the keeper's address. Apparently the vehicle keeper moved without informing DVLA... Which I thought was a criminal offence in itself?
39 ponies killed in the New Forest by motorists last year.
I'm confused, was this a triathlon race or not? I'm assuming it was a sanctioned race from what I've read, so my question is, and I hate to sound obvious here, but what the heck was a horse doing on a race event course? I don't see anyone wondering about that little problem. I don't see how this is any riders fault, you had a stream of bikes passing on the right which means there wasn't enough room on the course for the riders and a horse so a couple riders took to the left of the horse due to no space. Instead of the cops looking at the rider they need to be looking at the race officials for not policing the course better and keeping horses off of it...or maybe looking at the police themselves who I think was their job to keep the cyclists safe by keeping people, cars, and HORSES off the course of course... This is crazy, I use to race and we never had to encounter anything because the police made sure the course was shut down to only cyclists, the only thing we would see on occasion was wild life, but someone isn't riding and thus controlling a ground hog, or a snake, or whatever.
It remained an open and public road. Regular rules of the road apllied throughout - to all users.
I'm confused why people can't understand this.
I'm confused as to why the roads weren't closed for this sort of event, given it's scale and the nature of the local roads/traffic. But that's in the past.
I'm more baffled why people keep saying these cyclists/triathletes were drafting... It's irrelevant and you can't see enough to conclude that they were drafting anyway. Unless they are suggesting the horse was being drafted. Either way, WTF has unproven drafting got to do with anything here?
TBH the best thing possible in this situation is if they can't identify the cyclist.* Not to minimize the situation, but there are people who would love to use this to bash the community, when (as has been pointed out) this sort of thing happens daily on the roads with close passes. If you can hit and kill a cyclist, lie about it and still avoid jail then this is nothing. The scales of justice need rebalancing.
*Unless there is a way of 'triathloning' through water I am unaware of, a triathlete is a swimmer, cyclist, and runner.
I'd agree with Prosper0 that I'd doubt the riders just decided they didn't need to give more room (unlike many motorists). I'm guessing that the riders in front only moved slightly and at the last second and everyone behind was just focused on the rider in front, which gave them no time to react properly. The riders that undertook might have seen that as the safest option they had left (since we don't see rear video, it's possible that any other option they thought they had in that split-second could have resulted in taking out other riders or running into the back of the horse).
This isn't to say that they weren't riding inappropriately (btw, wondering if this was a no-draft tri, in which case several of them would have been in violation) or that they should have been more concerned about the horse's/rider's safety rather than their bike split, but it could be that it's getting blown a bit out of proportion. Hard to know for sure, but I can sympathize with those who are frustrated about how much publicity this is getting when no one was hurt compared to when vulnerable road users are seriously injured or killed by irresponsible drivers. When it becomes so common/normalized people don't really care as much, I guess.
No-one seems to be using their brain on this case. The style of (dangerous) riding by these triathletes simply doesn’t make sense. People are regarding this as if the triathletes have seen the horse and then chosen to be arseholes, when the truth is if they struck the horse they would be just as bad off as the horse/rider, probably worse.
The issue is that they were regarding this as a closed road race not expecting obstacles, clearly stem staring and not looking where they were going and then taking evasive action when spotting the horse whilst in a peloton.
Now everybody will tar actual cyclists with the same brush. These are Triathletes. Idiots.
Triathletes are cyclists. Anyone on a bicycle is a cyclist. You, and those who state anything other than this, are cycling-snobs.
The deplorable incident that happened here is just as likely to have occured had the cyclists been in the front group of a sportive.
Whoah there tiger, that is very dangerous talk.
if that is indeeds cyclings view / the reality, what does that mean for the future of public events such as sportives, races etc?
This is an extreme example of what can happen. The fact it doesn't normally happen is why this example has achieved such publicity.
There are a couple of questions to be asked here in my opinion, which sit with the organiser;
- was signage / event publicity in the local community sufficient. The horse riders account suggests not, why was this the case?
- If on open roads, why were riders drafting, which I believe is not allowed in amateur triathlons? How was the non-drafting rule being so easily flouted?
According to Human Race (interestingly enough, owned by TdF behemoth ASO), there was adequate signage erected days before the incident, which was increased at the time of the event. We have their word against the word of the horse rider, so who knows the truth, but they are a huge organisation and I would have expected them to have done this. They organise the Fred Whitton around these parts, and they put up warnings weeks in advance. Of course if you're going around with your head up your arse, you won't notice them (I'm not suggesting the rider was, by the way).
Drafting in a triathlon is allowed, but only for the time it takes to gain on your frontmarker and get past them. This is from a local events competitor notes:
"This race is a non-drafting race for all categories, meaning competitors are not allowed to take
shelter behind or beside another competitor or motor vehicle during the cycling segment of the
race. The draft zone is a rectangle measuring ten metres long by three metres wide, which surrounds every cycle on the cycle course.
The front edge of the front wheel defines the centre and top edge of the rectangle. A competitor
may enter the draft zone of another competitor but must be seen to be progressing through that zone. A maximum of 20 seconds is allowed to progress though the draft zone of another competitor. If an overtaking manoeuvre is not completed within 20 seconds, the overtaking cyclist must drop back. Time penalties and DQs will be issued by the referee for infringements."
There is a separate issue of whether drivers are adequately held to account for inadequate / reckless / deliberate endangerment of cyclists (they are not).
In relation to this incident, though, the cyclists were not adequately considerate or observant. They could and should all have seen the horse and then moved out far enough to overtake it. In particular the tw*t that undertook the horse has no excuse.
But according to the law and joe public this would be careless/inconsiderate cycling at the very most, we have an example only last week were a driver was on the wrong side of the road and according to police have seen the person they KILLED for 40+seconds, and yet the majority of the drivers peers adjudged it to be just a bit careless of her in her actions that killed a human being!
The judge apparently also thought it was only a minor incident and let the driver off with a little slap on the wrist, oh and this was replicated again later in the week and it's happened again and again and again. Those poor sods nr Rhyll where the Chief Inspector at the scene called it an accident, lied about the speed involved and then police decided that driving at 50mph on a bend on icy roads with bald tyres wasn't dangerous and no prosecution for killing four human beings, just a con and use infraction so £180 fine!
The bar is set, it's should not be in the public interest to do anything here going by the standard set by plod/cps and indeed the peers of the rider/s involved as we know their thoughts on what constitutes dangerous and it doesn't include killing people so a MINOR incident like this should not even be worth the bother.
I've recieved worse injuries from a motor and police weren't interested, THREE fucking times I've been injured including a hit and run, including a police officer witnessing the driver on one occasion confess to her actions and hitting me, they couldn't be fucking arsed.
As I said, it's a different set of rules/laws for people on bikes that we are held to (which in itself is unlawful) that in same/similar circumstances gets no media, no attention and police shrug their shoulders and flick you off.
Why are we not questioning the judgement of the horse rider to be on that road, at that time in the first place, oft police will tell you to get off a road because it is 'dangerous' due to other traffic posing a threat to you (major A roads, cycling at night etc even despite light traffic). They will even prosecute you for going on to a motorway despite the fact statitisically it's safer on the hard shoulder than most other roads. So why judge it would be safe to go along a section of road in the knowledge you have a very large wild/flight animal to control, except when it goes into flight mode you can't control it at all, it's not like a dog where you can hold it on a leash. I also don't believe the 'didn't see any signs' comment.
Are the cyclists dicks yes, but she has to shoulder some of the responsibility for going out on a section of road ignoring the warning signs that were up everywhere (according to the organisers) that made it no different to a cyclist going on the hard shoulder of a motorway.
again, we can't have one set of parameters/way of thinking for one group and not apply that to all the rest.
Just to comment on this particular nugget of crap.
From someone who claims to have been involved in collisions on at least 3 seperate occassions on public roads when you were no doubt aware of the presence of larger, faster motorised traffic. Do you really feel that you have some accountability for your injuries simply for being where you were, perfectly legally?
As to not being aware of the race? Many is the time I have gone out for a ride and come across gaggles of cyclists involved in some sportive or organised event that I had no clue was running that day at that particular time warning signs or not.
Nugget of crap sums you up sonshine.
Bother to actually read were I said the rules are being applied differently, you cannot on one hand say you can't/shouldn't go here because of an increased risk and/or speed/density of traffic that includes stuff that might potentially harm you or indeed others and then when an incident occurs you are blamed by everyone including authorities, only to then ignore that 'rule' or advice when it occurs to someone else/different road user. Just because you have a right to be there doesn't mean that that is a sensible thing to do given how our society behaves as a whole. call it whataboutery all you like but that is the world we live in and you cannot have different sets of rules for similar groups and then pass even if partially blame on to one but not the other.
This is crux of what I said, should the horse rider be allowed to ride there and feel safe to do so, absolutely, my partner rides a horse and has done since she was a child. I don't race but like to ride fast when appropriate and would have been completely on the opposite side of the road if I were going to go at any speed. That we already have motorvehicles overtaking us at 50/60/70mph on similar stretches of road often with not much difference in gap (aside from the guy who struck the horse) is utterly ignored by joe public, this occurs every single day, week in week out thousands of times over, often resulting in serious injury or death or to the point were people simply give up doing what they love through fear.
My partner wouldn't wilfully ignore signs to say a cycle race was going to take place and take her horse out at the times that she would know the event was on, because being responsible she knows that even a very steady horse that acts impeccably 99.99% of the time can at any instant behave irrationally, even with something very innocuous, if that means several hundred people on bikes plus cars are going to be on that same stretch of road she would either go out earlier or later or take it for a hack off road or do some jumps/trots etc on the training field next to the farm.
You should learn to read and understand what's being said Mr. McCrapnugget.
I did read what you wrote very carefully. I get that you have a crusade against the inappropriately lenient treatment of motorists who kill and injure others through negligence and wanton disregard for the safety of others. You are not wrong about that.
What I have called you out for is doing exactly what you accuse motorist sympathetic juries and judges of doing in apportioning blame to the victim for simply being in the wrong place at the wrong time and then speculating that they must have had some bizarre ulterior motive. Simply because the offenders in this particular example are cyclists.
Just call this as it is, wrong is wrong and don't attempt to conflate a horse rider being buzzed by morons on bicycles with unrelated incidents or hypothetical excursions onto a motorway hardshoulder.
I live nearby, there's no way you could have missed all the notification signs. At all. Maybe the full footage from the camera will show if they passed them or not ...
Whilst I agree that the comparitive reaction to how cyclists are treated by motorists needs consideration, we are muddying the waters here. Imagine if this video had been a cyclist pootling away and a dozen drivers passed like that, inside and outside at such speed and proximity.
Disgusting behaviour by a bunch of shithouse riders and giving the finger is the ulitmate sign of him/her thinking 'might is right'. I'd honestly question the thought of TTs being on open roads, I would suggest the better riders usually come out near the top but surely any junction, roundabout etc. just means those prepared to risk themselves or others will prosper!
Like charlie Alliston police/justice system will want to make an example of him. In the same way that plod will do everything they can to fob you off when a motorist hits you or in the case of Michael Mason and others actuvely blame you for your death/injury and state no case to answer.
As I said the difference in approach to prosecution and protection of people on bikes is hugely different compared to everyone else..
The BBC even printed a spurious bullshit comment by a woman who was "forced" to overtake 'speeding' cyclists riding 4 abreast then blamed them for her nearly crashing into an oncoming motorvehicle.
This was yet more bullshit used to bash those in the triathlon yet it was the motorists actions that were dangerous ffs!
Wonder what they will charge him with if they find him, dangerous cycling, careless cycling or furious cycling
https://www.cyclistsdefencefund.org.uk/cycling-offences
163 and 167 are irrelevant, this is filtering in slow moving traffic not overtaking.
214 perhaps, but it’s subjective as no passing distances or speed are given, as ever the Highway Code is shit
Entirely relevant, this is overtaking. Also 66-68.
It is not enumerated but I would suggest that at least one of those maneuvers obviously failed the 'plenty of room' criterium and a number of them were not riding 'slowly'. I thought you acknowledged that with your comment on their riding.
Why don’t you think this is filtering ? I’m only really talking about the cyclist passing on the left. But in general none of the passes by any of the cyclists is any different than I would expect from a motorist over taking a cyclist.
Also define ‘slowly’ in terms of the HW code ?
Either filtering (which is not a recommended maneuver in the HWC, just a situation that may occur) or overtaking have the onus on care - which is clearly breeched. If you wish to call it 'filtering' then go ahead, it's over-taking to me (or under-taking if people wish). The duty of care is also applicable to some of those passing on the outside of the horse, in particular that last group, and especially when passing an animal - as explicitly laid out in the HWC.
As for the definition of 'slowly' - as I said, it's not defined - that is why I used the phrase "I suggest" and only for a number of riders, certainly not all. Feel free to disagree, entirely your prerogative obviously. Think i'm done anyway, can't see you changing your mind on the meaning of 'care' or what is or is not overtaking, just find it depressing that you can suggest that the actions of the rider on the left are in anyway consistent with the wording or apparent intent of the code. Whatever, lifes too short mate.
A lot of Whataboutism going on in this post.
Yes, the police should do more about close passes and the government more about supporting Cyclists and fixing the dreadful way many motorists believe that cyclists do not have a right to be on the road.
However, the way many of the cyclists pass this horse rider is unacceptable. We all know that when you see a horse rider you slow down and give plenty of space.
If you're determined to use clever-sounding interspaz lingo like "whataboutism" (the correct term is "whataboutery" BTW) perhaps you should understand what such terms mean.
I don't see anyone defending the poor riding of those triathletes. However, pointing out the glaring double standards of both the public and the police when cyclists suffer similar (and far worse) poor treatment from motorists is a perfectly valid point to make.
It’ll be interesting to see what the police are going to charge the cyclist with. Playing devils advocate the cyclist passing on the left are just filtering aren’t they ? As per the HW code.
Perhaps cps will go with the class W&F charge, which just about guarantee a conviction at the hands of a jury of motorists. Given that nobody was injured it’ll be interesting what prison sentence they’ll get, I would think 6 months at least as the bay mob will need to appeased. Also am I missing something or does the impact not happen on camera ? as every cyclist with a helmet cam knows that means it didn’t happen according to the police.
Nope.
really ? Why ? Perhaps the speed aspect, but that’s subjective and the HW code does sent a speed limit.
Disclamer, I wouldn’t ride like this in a million years, and the rider are dicks.
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