Safe Speed Forums

Please help me on this one!

Under normal circumstances I'm a fairly patient, steady driver, but above everything - even pulling out from a junction in front of me, tailgating really bugs me.

I know its an issue and am learning to let them past, but when I'm tired or stressed I feel compelled not to let them past. This ends up with some dangerous driving and I kick myself for not learning. It lasts about 2 or 3 seconds and then I regain control.

I never feel like attacking another driver, and don't tailgate myself.

Does anyone else suffer from the same thing? Has anyone overcome it, and how did you do it?

yep! all the time, I just do as the IAM book Driving advises and that is to slow down so that you have a greater disance between you and the vehicle in front to allow for you to brake for them also, (this really p****s them off too!)

another tactic which I have used is to drive slow, speed up, drive slow, speed up (repeat), this really confuses the hell outa them and in the end they don't understand what's going on and hang back lol

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Welcome to the UK, the Land of "Selective Freedoms"

See the Safe Speed page on tailgating: http://www.safespeed.org.uk/tailgate.html

Ultimately the answer is to take control. When you're in control there's much less threat and much less stress.

And

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Paul Smith
Our scrap speed cameras petition got over 28,000 sigs
The Safe Speed campaign demands a return to intelligent road safety

Thanks for the swift reply. The speed up/slow down method isn't quite right because you are engaging in a road game, taking your attention and focus away from what you are doing into a game with the other driver. You will then be watching the RVM to see how he (usually a he) reacts.

Yes, I've read the page, thanks. I'll take to memorizing it. I was wondering more about the psychology of recognising internal patterns of behaviour and changing them. The loss of control I talk about is exactly as above.

There's no "adrenaline rush" or elements of rage, its just pure irritation. I do feel it as an infringement of my personal space.

Maybe viewing it as a challenge to apply the theory?

Try the 'choose your rearguard' thing. It cuts down the number of time you'll have to deal with it.

Of course, many folk do the opposite. Perhaps by muscling in to a smaller gap in L3, they have unwittingly chosen a tailgater to follow them.

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Paul Smith
Our scrap speed cameras petition got over 28,000 sigs
The Safe Speed campaign demands a return to intelligent road safety

Whilst we're on the subject, I've noticed that I get tailgated more often in my Rover than I did in my Golf. I don't drive any differently either.

I've also noticed more tailgating as the nights get darker. Possibly something to do with tiredness or poor night vision?

It irritates me too, Kingsize, but I've learned to deal with it without getting angry or flustered. My usual tactics, ONLY ever practised in town BTW (not ENTIRELY as per safespeed's recommendations but they do seem to work well) is either resting my foot on the brake peddle so that the lights come on but there's no braking effort - usually combined with gentle slowing up on the engine, and if that fails (assuming I have lights on) a two second burst of the fogs - I have twin fogs on my car. This is normally enough to wake up the muppets, and if I have a REALLY agressive tailgater then I just slow up until I feel comfortable. If they can pass then I let them and if not I'm allowing myself more room and time so I don't have to brake hard.

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Science won over religion when they started installing lightning rods on churches.

The slow down, speed up, slow down method is plain daft.

I don't go out to tailgate, but the occasions when I've thought to myself "I'm too close to the car in front" have been caused by a differential of acceleration/deceleration, i.e. someone who speeeds up or slows down more gently than I do.

Example, following someone you've just encountered out of a tight corner onto a long NSL straight, you might assume they're going to accelerate quite briskly, but it's very hard to match a rate of acceleration, so you might end up too close to them for a brief period. Equally, some folk brake very early for bends. As you may not expect this, you will be too close to them for a short period, until you've slowed to the same extent.

Obviously this discounts tailgating on DC's, MWays etc., but on smaller roads where the vehicle speed goes up and down I think this a large factor in perceived tailgating.

Hence, you're likely to end up with someone a lot further up your arse (if briefly) if you keep changing speed.

Johnny - I wouldn't necesarrily consider your scenario to be tailgating. Yes you're too close to the car in front, but only temporarily. I would call it tailgating if it were constant for more than, say, 10 - 15s.

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Science won over religion when they started installing lightning rods on churches.

For a dozy tailgater washing your windscreen often helps them concentrate more on what is in front of them.

Mind you seeing a prat in an open top Saab wave his fist at me after I washed my windscreen for the third time (naughty, I know!) I laughed.

From personal experience I wouldn't recommend anything that could irritate the driver behind, as if they are already in the wrong frame of mind your little action such as washers, fog lights, or even gently braking could be the trigger for a road rage attack. It happened to Mrs Rewolf (with myself as passenger) when the car behind us in L3 got annoyed that she wasn't going fast enough at a mere 80mph passing vehicles doing 75mph in L2. She did the gentle flash of brake lights, and no sooner had we pulled into the first safe gap in L2 than the car came past, cut in front of us and braked very hard. We slipped back into L3 to avoid colliding, so he accelerated and did the same again in L3, repeat again in L2. At the end we were doing 30mph on a fast moving M40, and only me using a mobile to pretend to call the Police go him to stop trying to cause an accident. You have been warned.

I'm afraid to say that I succumbed to a tailgater yesterday. I'm working in Manchester all week and driving up the M6 in the SPECS area around Jct 14 (I think?) I was in L3 (the contraflow section) and some prat was following me too closely. I slowed down but he just got closer and closer and was hovering a few inches off my bumper so I briefly stamped on my brake pedal. Looked in the RVM and the front of his car dived and a bit of smoke came off his tyres... I know I shouldn't have but I'm human. It worked though.

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Pecunia Prius Equitas et Salus

EXACTLY.

We should be far above this sort of thing anyway.

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Paul Smith
Our scrap speed cameras petition got over 28,000 sigs
The Safe Speed campaign demands a return to intelligent road safety

I'm not quite sure what this method is that SafeSpeed are recomending, but it sounds very similar to a technique I use occasionally to discourage tailgators. I first came up with it about ten years ago and I've used it literally only three or four times since then. I make a conscious effort not to hold up people behind me so it's not something that I would expect to use at all often, but occasionally there's somebody you can't get rid of who's dangerously close. Under those circumstances it's a highly effective and non-confrontational way to pursuade somebody behind you to back off. It doesn't take a huge amount of attention, and it's so subtle that I suspect that nobody around me realizes that I'm doing it including the victim.

The technique is to slow down fractionally and let the gap behind me close to the point that the tailgator responds and slows down. Having matched speeds they slow down even more to drop back to a distance they're comfortable with (which is a lot closer than *I'm* comfortable with). While they're dropping back, I accelerate forwards and resume my previous cruising speed. This means that they drop back further than they intended so they accelerate to close the gap again. As they do that, I decelerate fractionally so they overshoot again, and have to react even more. By keeping my own speed adjustments out of phase with theirs I encourage them to overshoot more and more, and with just a few mph variations in my own speed carefully timed, I can make them work very hard indeed to stay that close. There's no overt aggression, no lights, braking (implied or actual) or signal that you're trying to tell them off. The closer they are the more effective it is, and so far I've never needed to do this more than two or three times before they drop back to a more comfortable distance.

I think of it as shrugging off somebody who is too close behind you in a crowd. Nothing personal, but just give me some space.

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Peter Humphries (and a green V8S)

how about bolting one of those 1,000,000 candle power searchlights to your rear parcel shelf and.....................BINGO

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Welcome to the UK, the Land of "Selective Freedoms"

greenv8s - at times there's no way you can let them pass/ find a roundabout to go round twice etc - so i use a similar method - find that a lot of the ones that tailgate are short of the skills to see what is happening and decide that distance is the better part of valour after a few bits of this treatment. Another technique in towns that i adopt is to get to a road junction/roundabout , see a gap, but wait a fraction longer than needed -anticipate a vehicle going round ( most of them are short on this sort of skill)- pull out fast ,leaving tailgater waiting for next gap. Another variation on the IAM idea.
But the better idea would be some positive reaction from trafpol ---(whoops sorry - they cost too much ,and must be disbanded)

I found that as I try to reduce my fuel consumption (Each day I try to get my mpg higher than the previous day) it has an interesting effect on tailgaters. Because I try to anticipate more, and let the car engine break more, and use my breaks less. They have to move back. It is much like the effect that greenv8s is taking about.

Edit: The problem is as more people just use the car in front to tell them to break. My efforts to reduce my fuel consumption, can lead to a higher than average number of tailgaters.

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Oct 11 Birmingham Half Marathon. I am running for the British Heart Foundation.
http://www.justgiving.com/Rob-Taylor

It's good to read other peoples feelings about the matter. I've ordered a copy of "mind driving" and will be interested to read if there's anything relevant in there. What I've found helpful to improve my driving habits in the past is a little mental commentary, in order to move the emotive element into a logical process. So I've taken to it again to include the rear-gaurd and adding a logical strategy to deal with it, based on my driving style.

Today, I left early and added some more time to my journey in order to experiment a little. I found that in addition to the road ahead, I was thinking, for example "looks like he wants to pass but he's leaving a reasonable distance, I'll give him good opportunity I don't trust him".

Sure enough he decided to do so approaching the brow of a hill +blind crossroads SLC. I'd anticipated and slowed as he was beside me. Sure enough, he wanted to go 80 and was right up some poor soul's tailpipe (that I'd kept at about 400-600 yards) on the approach to a roundabout.

Previously I had no real tactic other than to speed up a little, then - the irritation would kick in, making the journey uncomfortable.

Its interesting to read that someone noticed an increace in tailgating at night and that most seem to relate it to a motorway experience rather than A/B single lane.

BottyBurp - I have felt and nearly done exactly the same thing. Its that kind of loss of control that scares me. All I can do is share a little feeling I observed today. In letting the potential tailgater past, as well as a little irritation, there was some satisfaction that I'd already planned the event, that I had control. I was comfortable, safe, and enjoying testing the technique. There was a smug satisfaction that I'd read his intention 3/4 mile ago., and a brief sadistic shimmer that he's tailgating some other poor bugger in front.

Yep. Excellent. Good driving is it's own reward.

It's well worth mentally patting yourself on the back when your skill and anticipation keeps you well away from the trouble.

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Paul Smith
Our scrap speed cameras petition got over 28,000 sigs
The Safe Speed campaign demands a return to intelligent road safety

Another tactic - when tailgated - as per IAM- leave additional space in front. But the first time car in front brakes, brake a bit more sharply( not enough to cause road rage, but more than is needed - at this time check for one behind) and if any danger of getting rear ended , slack off- you've got room to do it. Most times it makes one behind aware of just how close they have come -because a lot of people don't recognise a safe braking distance - if it don't - it's time to work on tactics to get rid of them - either by getting them past you , or juggling another car in behind.(late pull out at junction/roundabout works well)

I just continue to drive "normally" with a big gap in front of me if tailgated.

As above, driving anything other than smoothly and normally is going to make their behaviour more hazardous.