Tag: tvam editorial

From The Saddle (August 2023)

Posted on | by Adrian Ellison

After a blistering June, July has not been much to write home about. Nonetheless, I hope that you’ve managed to find some time in the saddle either here in the UK or touring abroad?

Fifty-six of us managed to dodge the showers at the beginning of July for the Observer Weekend in Wales. I was delighted that we had 12 Trainee Observers join us, with six members coming for their first time. It only represents around 35% of the Observer Corps and so I want to know how we can make it even more inclusive. We focused on giving feedback, using the 1-10 scalar technique, and on tips to better fill out Run Report Forms, so don’t be surprised if your Observer tries some of these out on your next ride!

Much of the Committee’s time last month was spent preparing for the huge changes at St Crispin’s School. An army of volunteers arrived at 7.30am to plan out how best to make use of our allocation of the front car park and to ensure marshals were on hand to guide everyone safely in and out. We were blessed with some fine weather, which certainly helped. We are indebted to all of you that helped make the last St Crispin’s work. Yes, we learned a few things along the way, and will make a few changes for this month. Hopefully by September, the School will have erected a temporary canteen that we will be able to use. Again, we thank you for your continued patience.

I often get questions about Groups.io, especially why some messages get posted and others don’t. So, I thought I would explain how and why we use it. We’ve been using Groups.io since April 2019. Before that, we relied upon a number of Yahoo groups that were created by various members, over which, we had no control. Messages were sent by email – some of you still love email and some of you (like me) loathe it! Groups.io allows you to use email to post and pick up messages if you wish and there is a mobile app for those that prefer that. You choose how you want to be notified of new messages. For example, there is a Digest containing all the message text of up to 12 messages and the Daily Summary, which contains links to messages which can then be read online. Members opting to receive individual messages rather than a Digest or Summary appears to be the most popular.

The Committee have been tracking the usage of Groups.io as an indicator of member engagement since October 2019. The data shows a really high level of participation. In the last year an average of 97% of the membership were registered users (and in some months, that reached 99%). In the same year, on average, 466 posts by 167 members were made each month. The highest number of posts in a month was in September 2020, at 988 (by 255 members), which perhaps does not surprise, given it was at the height of Covid! The lowest number of posts in a month, at 305, was in March this year, which is a little more surprising but still a good level of engagement.

So why don’t we use WhatsApp or any other social media tool for that matter? Well, there is a simple reason for that – compliance. As a Club, Company and Charity, any tool we use for Club business must be compliant with Data Protection, the Equalities Act, the Defamation Act and a whole lot more legislation. It is worth noting that Groups.io has no advertising and no tracking (so it’s free from the prying eyes of your favourite search engine). The club therefore needs to be able to control who has access, when access is revoked (i.e. if a member leaves TVAM) and to keep the space free from defamatory or other unwanted content. We also need to make sure as much of the content posted is relevant to as many of you as possible. With such a big Club, this isn’t always an easy task and there is a fine balance to be struck between what some might call ‘moderation’ and others ‘censorship’. To help in that distinction, we published some guidelines. The full set can be found here: https://tvam.groups.io/g/allmembers/guidelines.

A few topics that sometimes cause confusion are:

  • You may only post for sale items that are yours. You can’t post on behalf of non-members and only motorcycling related items are allowed.
  • You can’t request support for other charities, however noble the cause. Potential exceptions are information on MAG activities, marshal support for the Reading Toy Run and comment on Air Ambulance activities, but not fund raising.
  • Team runs can be posted on the Local Team calendar. For all-member club rides, messages are not sent to remind everyone about rides that are on the allmembers calendar but are included in the calendar summary every Friday. No reminders are sent for individual rides. Upcoming events are advertised on the Wiki banner, where possible.

Groups.io is the Club communications tool, with separate subgroups for each local team, for Observers (including trainee Observers), run leaders, and team leaders. It’s also a great place to find out what’s going on – check out the calendar – and some events are designed so that you can sign-up (RSVP) online too. There is information in the Wiki section as well as a host of documentation in the Files section, including electronic versions of all the advanced riding documents, SatNav routes (also available as PDFs), minutes of the various meetings and electronic versions of Slipstream. So please do make the most of it.

I am indebted to Andy Wedge and Chris Brownlee for running Groups.io, which is no easy feat and takes considerable time and effort.

Finally, just another plug for the excellent TVAM Online Quizzes. Brush up on your knowledge – how much of the Highway Code do you still remember? How many of you have updated your copy with the new one? What about your knowledge of the Advanced Rider Course (ARC), Motorcycle Roadcraft and Motorcycle Control? Two versions of the quizzes are available via the Groups.io Wiki (https://tvam.groups.io/g/allmembers/wiki/25650). Level 1 is designed to test your knowledge of the Highway Code and Road Signs and Level 2 adds in Roadcraft and the Advanced Rider Course. They are ideal if you are an Associate preparing for your advanced test. There is also a more detailed Observer quiz available via the Observer Wiki for those validating or revalidating as a National Observer or an Observer about to undertake your National Observer validation or revalidation.

Here’s hoping that sun comes out soon and you can make the most of it!

Adrian Ellison
Chief Observer

From the Chair (July 2023)

Posted on | by Barrie Smith

As I start writing this piece, I’m checking the weather forecast for the weekend ahead. The BBC weather app is showing one thing and, of course, the Met Office weather app is showing the complete opposite. What am I worrying about, I hear you cry, it’s summer so what can possibly go wrong? Well, I am about to head to Wales for the Observer Weekend, at the Metropole Hotel in Llandrindod Wells, and there’s a reason that Wales has beautiful green countryside!

The Observer Weekend is the annual training weekend for Observers. It’s an opportunity for us to meet together to discuss all things ‘Observory’ and receive updates on changes within our training. We usually have two classroom sessions, one on the Saturday and one on the Sunday, as well as a road-based exercise
followed by some social riding on the excellent Welsh roads. It’s also a chance to meet and work with some of our new Trainee Observers and help them on their continued journey within TVAM.

Let’s hope I can stand in front of you at St Crispin’s this month and report what a great sunny weekend we had.

Talking of St Crispin’s, for those of you who couldn’t attend in June, I have to announce that our monthly meetings are going to look significantly different for the next 12 months.

At the end of June, the school started a major building project that involves the canteen and main hall and therefore we’re losing the use of these areas for our monthly meetings, as well as our parking area and slow manoeuvring area at the rear of the school.

The project is to create a 400-seat canteen and improved student movement areas at the rear of the school. Much housing development has taken place around Wokingham, particularly in the catchment area for St Crispin’s School. No new secondary schools have been built and therefore the intake for St Crispin’s will rise significantly in the coming years. Coupled with this, the school has had a safety audit and it has recommended that vehicular movements are to be limited to the front of the school, for everyone other than emergency vehicles.

So, along with all other users of the school, all parking and vehicle movements from July St Crispin’s will be confined to the front car park and this is going to require some management by marshals to assist members with where best to park and see people through to the rear of the site. Thank you to those people who have already volunteered to assist with this from July onwards.

When you arrive in the front car park, marshals will be there to point you to where is best to park your motorcycle, based on what you’re doing that morning. We will try to allocate areas for Associates and Observers who wish to do observed rides. There will also be areas for those Full Members who want to attend a social ride and for Members who wish to attend the slow manoeuvring and machine handling courses. Finally, we’ll try and allocate an area for the many people who attend St Crispin’s to make the morning run smoothly and don’t generally go out and ride. Please try to be clear on what your intention is for the morning, to give the marshals the best opportunity to get you parked somewhere suitable.

We’ll also do our best to ensure a smooth exit, at various times, for our social rides and observed rides. This may mean that we need to stagger the exit of our social rides in order to ensure safety for all users.

As I have said, our courses will run in the front car park once the observed and social rides have left. If you’re returning from an observed ride and these courses are still running, please be courteous and park in an area away from these activities. There’s nothing quite as distracting as a rider cutting across your path when you are doing a slow riding exercise.

From this month, our meeting will be in the Science Block area at the far end of the school. There is a walkway through from the front car park and you’ll be pointed in the appropriate direction. There is a large external covered area that we will utilise; weather permitting.

From September onwards we should have use of a temporary canteen that is being erected next to where we used to hold the slow riding course.

We’ll need everyone to help where they can and be as flexible as possible to enable this to work. Things are going to look very different for the next couple of months, before getting fully into the temporary accommodation, and it will be at least 12 months before we get back to anything like normal.

This month will be a learning exercise for both us and the school. Please help us and the school by making this work, as we want St Crispin’s to be the home of TVAM for many years to come. The Committee will update the membership via groups.io and Slipstream about specific changes, as and when we’re aware of them.

Thanks for your cooperation.

Barrie Smith
TVAM Chair

From The Saddle (June 2023)

Posted on | by Adrian Ellison

Finally, a spell of summer sunshine. I hope you’ve all been out on your motorcycles making the most of it. We know that many of you have been on TVAM’s social rides: 413 of you joined 36 social rides in April alone, and that was before the sun came out!

I recently had a friend stay from South Korea on his way to Canada. He wanted to visit Wales and so I booked a lovely Airbnb near Llanidloes for a few days. This time travelling in the Mustang, I was still able to enjoy some of the fabulous roads that Wales has to offer, but without the ability to overtake quite as keenly as I would on the bike. The fine weather (yes, it does happen in Wales sometimes) brought out many a motorcyclist, either riding solo or in groups. In fact, there were a number of foreign groups, including a contingent of Dutch Harley riders gathered in Aberystwyth. What this meant was that I was able to sit back in the car and watch riders out on the road, and experience being overtaken by many. This led to a number of observations and “gosh, I don’t think I would have done that” moments.

First, I noticed a tendency for riders in groups to try and keep up with each other, seemingly at all costs. A good example was a group overtaking a queue of cars on approach to a solid white line and a blind summit. The first three riders completed the overtakes safely and in plenty of time. The fourth rider cut the white line a bit fine but the fifth and sixth riders were clearly over the solid white, at a pace that was maybe too fast with closing oncoming traffic; the car flashing its lights not totally unexpected. It didn’t seem to me that the “ride for yourself” mantra was being practiced.

Second, a comment about following distances. I had a number of instances where a motorcycle had overtaken one vehicle to come up to mine and sat right on my chuff, literally a few feet away from my bumper. Clearly waiting for the next overtaking opportunity, this posed a risk to both rider and me, and to compensate, I increased my own following distance from the car in front. Of course, what that did was to invite him to overtake me and said rider then found himself hugging the back of the car in front, trying to jump him or her too. We do allow a closing of the safe following distance to one second when an overtake might be on but we all know to drop back to two seconds when it clearly isn’t.

Riders riding in groups were also getting very close to each other, especially at speeds approaching or even exceeding the National limit. Some were trying to ride offset, but were invariably still too close. If anything had happened necessitating a rapid brake application, I am not sure all would have come out unscathed.

Marking rides was also variable, with some markers choosing some of the most inappropriate (i.e. unsafe!) places to stop in order to wave their fellow riders through. I saw one marker stopped on a zig-zag of a pedestrian crossing and another on a level crossing!

The first task for a marker is to keep themselves safe. This is made all the easier with a run leader knowing where best to drop them.

So what has all of this got to do with TVAM? I know that “we” would all be far more aware of these poor practices. But it does ram home the need for riding within your own capability, especially when the temptation might be to “keep up with your mates” on some fine roads in a social context in fine weather. As members of TVAM, we should be upholding the advanced riding standard at all times and acting as ambassadors for the Club on the road. These examples also stress the importance of effective run leading and back marking, and particularly the run leader’s pre-ride briefing. We are making our own Club social rides more descriptive, focusing more on route complexity, run length and time between stops. From this month’s St Crispin’s, Green Team ride outs will not be graded, the idea being that social rides should cater for every rider, riding to their own capability and with effective run leading, back marking and good use of the marker-system, making the ride enjoyable for all.

When I got back from Wales, I had one of my many chats with Barrie Smith, our Chair, and remarked on a new route I had discovered: the A485 from Aberystwyth to Tregaron and then over the Esgair pass and down the Devil’s Staircase to Beulah. “Oh that…” he said, “was where the ‘bimble’ in Barrie’s Bimble came from, having had an evening ride out from Doddy Wells.” It goes to show, we all know all the best roads in the country! Definitely one I want to go back to but on the VFR.

While on the subject of trips away, if you are planning your own trip abroad this summer with fellow Club members, remember not to fall foul of the EU package travel directive. If you are booking travel and accommodation, irrespective of how this is paid for, it would constitute a “package” and potentially expose yourself to liabilities for cancellations and/or repatriation. This is easily overcome by using our Club-approved travel partner – Not just Travel. Alex Harding was at St. Crispin’s last month and will be back periodically to offer practical advice on booking trips. He said he is happy to book specific travel and hotels, so please do discuss your needs with him direct (https://alexharding.notjusttravel.com/) This is good for you and good for the Club too, as we receive a modest commission back that we can reinvest in you.

So, here’s hoping the sun keeps on shining!

Adrian Ellison
Chief Observer

From the Chair (May 2023)

Posted on | by Barrie Smith

I’m writing this piece at a really busy time for the Club, with the riding season really getting off to a fantastic start and so much going on for all members.
I’m just back from France where I have spent 4 days, with 3 friends (TVAM members), visiting 3 of my great, great Uncle’s graves. They all served in the Allied Forces in WW1 and unfortunately never came home. Whilst the weather wasn’t always in our favour, it was certainly a great long weekend riding around the French countryside, on some great roads, that clearly looks significantly different than it would have 125 years ago.

If you have never ridden abroad, then a trip across to northern France is a great way to get some experience. Do look at the specific road traffic laws though, as priority on junctions is not as clear cut as it is in the UK. In fairness, the locals appear to understand that us Brits are unlikely to get it right all the time and are relatively tolerant of our errors!

Whilst I was away in France, both 7Ws and Welsh Wanders took over Llandrindod Wells in mid Wales. Apologies that the Club didn’t manage to coordinate better on the timings for these two trips, as we know that many people like to attend both weekends where possible. We promise to do a better job of getting the dates sorted so there is less likelihood of a clash in future (WW September – 7Ws October ’23).

7Ws appears to have been another successful training weekend, with 17 Associates, 12 Observers, 5 Trainee Observers and 8 Full Members having a great time.

Welsh Wanders saw 31 Club members away for a weekend of social riding on the fantastic Welsh roads.

Thank you to the organisers of both of these Club events that are put on for the benefit of the membership and new dates for both weekends are already announced in the late summer, early autumn.

And the fun didn’t stop there. The last weekend in April saw both a Core Skills Day and BikeCraft both hosted in the Sixth Form Block at St Crispin’s.

The Core Skills Day saw 8 new Trainee Observers working with 8 Full Observers and the Training Team to develop their communication and observing skills. This is a day of workshops and breakout sessions where the Trainee Observers learn ways to meet new Associates and take them through an observed riding session. It’s just one of the many disciplines that our Trainee Observers have to complete in order to become an Observer with TVAM/IAM RoadSmart.

I was lucky enough to sit in on the BikeCraft day that was being hosted by our excellent BikeCraft team. Di Woodcock, Richard Barker, Paul Naish and Steve Mason took 11 members through the fundamentals of riding, working in harmony with your machine and making progress, all in a classroom environment with some great images, videos and practical advice. Thank you all for a really informative day. I cannot recommend this course highly enough for Associates working towards their test and Full Members wishing to refresh their own knowledge.

We have lots coming up in the next month between the May and June Club Meetings. There are no less than 12 social rides on various dates; Castle Combe Skills Day on 23rd May; the RAMs T-Run on 28th May; Look Lean Roll on 11th June; Run Leader & Back Marker course on 17th June and of course St Crispin’s on the 18th June. All are published in the Slipstream and Groups.io calendars and regular reminders come out weekly on Group.io to jog your memory. Why not join another local team for a social ride or try something new to keep up your skills? If any Observers are available to support the T-Runs throughout the riding season, I’m sure that you’ll be welcomed with open arms by the various local teams. The more we can work together, the better for all our members.

I’m just off now to pack for 3Rs, the Full Member Training Weekend in Llandrindod Wells that takes 20 Full Members and 10 Observers to Wales for a balanced
weekend of social and observed rides, with plenty of tall tales and banter in the bar afterwards. Hopefully you’ll be able to read about it in next month’s Slipstream.

Whatever you’re planning on doing this month, have fun and ride safe everyone.

Barrie Smith
TVAM Chair

From The Saddle (April 2023)

Posted on | by Adrian Ellison

As I write this the first shoots of Spring seem to be struggling with a chill wind blowing down from the Arctic and more threats of snow! Hopefully by the time you read this, Spring will have finally sprung, it will be warmer, the sun will be shining and we’ll all be out on our bikes (or maybe not!).

TVAM already has a huge programme of events planned for the coming year, with something for everyone. A quick flick through the last edition of Slipstream showed over 37 events between March and June, with more going in each month.

I wanted to showcase two of our training activities. The 21-23 April sees the first of our 7Ws trips to Wales this year. And it will be run again later in the year. 7Ws is designed for all Club members and particularly for those that have not experienced a weekend away on their motorcycle before. For Associates, it’s an ideal opportunity to receive some intensive coaching through observed rides, both on the ride over to Wales and while there; for Green team members, a chance to hone their advanced riding skills; and for Observers, a chance to enjoy some of the finest roads and scenery Great Britain has to offer. Above all, 7Ws is a chance to enjoy some great company with like-minded people and to share the day’s riding stories over dinner. Feedback has been incredibly positive and we are always keen to hear how we might make it even better. As Observers have to work, the Club – rightly – subsidises the cost for them a little.

The second shout out goes to the individual local team T-Runs – the ‘T’ being for Training. These offer another opportunity for Associates to receive some intensive coaching from their local Observers and Salli explains all on page 22.

While on the subject of training and with the start of the new riding season being a great time to brush up on your knowledge, how much of the Highway Code do you still remember? How many of you have updated your copy with the new one? (It’s available online too: https://www.gov.uk/guidance/the-highway-code). What about your knowledge of the Advanced Rider Course (ARC), Motorcycle Roadcraft and motorcycle control? TVAM has a couple of online quizzes to help test your knowledge… when did you last give them a try? They are available via the Groups.io Wiki here: https://tvam.groups.io/g/allmembers/wiki/25650. Level 1 is designed to test your knowledge of the Highway Code and Road Signs and Level 2 adds in Roadcraft and the Advanced Rider Course. They are ideal if you are an Associate preparing for your advanced test or an Observer about to undertake your validation or re-validation.

Over the past six years there have been 2,216 attempts at Level 1 (that’s an average of 369 attempts per year) scoring an average of 84% and 1,568 attempts at Level 2 (average of 261 attempts per year) scoring an overall average of 82%. Pretty good!

The numbers of you attempting the quizzes this year are down, so if you haven’t yet had a go then please do give it a try. And if you’ve not had a go for a while, now is a good time to have another go, as both quizzes have been updated to include the latest Highway Code changes.

Safe riding!

Adrian Ellison
Chief Observer

From the Chair (March 2023)

Posted on | by Barrie Smith

I always find the start of the year strange, in that it seems to take us forever to get through January and then February goes by in a blur. Maybe, because of the colder, damper conditions we’re just not out on our bikes as much enjoying ourselves. It’s hard to believe that we’re now well into March and springtime is beckoning us to uncover the bikes that we carefully put away for the winter (those that didn’t ride throughout), give them a dust off, a really good clean and check them over before firing them back into life.

For those people that did mothball their bikes over the winter months, it’s worth taking a look at an article that Pat Coneley wrote in Slipstream back in April ’13 (page 21). You can find past copies of Slipstream on groups.io under ‘files’ in the ‘all members’ section.

It’s important to check our bikes regularly, particularly after lengthy spells of not riding. The Advanced Rider Course (ARC) talks about pre-ride checks and Roadcraft specifically uses the acronym POWDDERSS to work around your machine. Most of us like to add another S (self) to the end, ensuring that we’re also ready to ride the bike. We carry out these checks to assist in preventing incidents happening. That said, when incidents do happen it’s important that we reflect on what happened, why it happened and see if there is anything that we could have done differently to change the course of events. It’s then really good practice to let the Club know about the incident.

Nick Edgley has written a piece for this month’s Slipstream that looks at an incident and the importance of reporting it. I would urge you all to read this and please do let the Club know about any incidents that you may be involved in. We only use the data to enable us to build courses to learn from each other.

Looking ahead to getting out and riding, the calendar does seem to be filling up nicely with many social rides. It seems that with many of the social teams offering regular social rides, pretty much every weekend in the calendar has a ride, or a choice of rides, that you can take part in. We also have our training and social riding weekends starting.

The fantastic 7Ws takes place on the 21st – 23rd April in Llandrindod Wells in Wales and is followed two weeks later, on the 5th – 7th May, with the 3Rs weekend at the same venue. These are weekends with an emphasis on training, however they have social riding elements built into them. 7Ws is geared at Associates and 3Rs is geared at Full Members. The feedback that we received from participants on these weekends in 2022 was overwhelmingly positive in relation to the organisation, location, venue and structure of the events. We carefully review all feedback and make changes as necessary.

For members that wish to have a social weekend in Wales, Welsh Wanders is also taking place in Llandrindod Wells on the 21st-23rd April. So, what better way to kick-start the 2023 riding season than riding arguably the best roads in the UK and socialising with large groups of friends in these three weekend trips.

A couple of items for Observers to note. Adrian, our Chief Observer, has published the list for Aardvarks on groups.io, so please try to find your riding buddy and get these booked as soon as possible. The earlier you book, the better the chance of getting the best dates to suit you both. The Observer Weekend is also running again in Llandrindod Wells from the 30th June – 2nd July and booking for this is now available on the TVAM Webshop. An early bird discount is available.

Spring is looking like being really busy for TVAM members so have fun and stay safe everyone.

Barrie Smith
TVAM Chair

From The Saddle (February 2023)

Posted on | by Adrian Ellison

This is my first “From the Saddle” article. It’s a great privileged to have been elected as Chief Observer at the AGM and I have some big boots to fill. My first job is to thank Chris Brownlee for his five years of hard work and dedication to TVAM. I am only just finding out just how big those boots are! Thanks also to the 100+ of you that supported the AGM. There were some good ideas for the Committee to consider going forward.

Next, I thought I’d say a little about me. For those that don’t already know me, I joined TVAM in 2006, being a relative latecomer to biking. I did my Direct Access in 2005 and bought a big bike (a Speed Triple 1050) thinking I could ride it. How wrong I was, and it took many months of coaching from my then Observer, George Green, to get me to a test pass. I will never forget my test: having to postpone the first one on the day as my bike wouldn’t start after filling it up. Walking back up the hill from the petrol station to Taplow railway station car park where I was meeting my examiner, the late Martin White, remarked “Haven’t you forgotten something?” Bless him, he took me pillion back to my bike and stayed with me until the AA arrived. I learned the hard way that Triumph electrics weren’t always 100% reliable and had a new rectifier fitted under warranty!

As my confidence grew, I was keen to give something back to the Club and to continue my learning. I joined the TOb programme, getting my yellow badge in 2009. With some helpful advice on my first TVAM tour, I finally mastered the 3-stage overtake. I received my gold badge in 2010 and my National Observer qualification in 2018.

I was one of the founding team leaders of the RAMS, along with Tony Stanley, who has since left the Club, although his infamous “Tony’s Tours” live on and I’ve been lucky to have been on many all over Europe. Tony and I did three years of leading the RAMs before passing on the baton.

I managed to keep a low profile until in 2016 when the late David Jacobi, who was by then Club Chairman, asked for volunteers and particularly someone who might help out as Club Secretary. Gingerly, I asked Dave for more details knowing that once Dave had you in his sights there was no escape. I had some previous experience serving on charitable boards as a trustee and my day job – I’m a Chief Information Officer for a university – put me in good stead. No surprise, I was co-opted on to the Committee and elected Club Secretary in March 2017, a role I held for 5 years, standing down at the AGM in 2022. My second respite didn’t last long. I joined the Training Team shortly after and, well, here I am.

So, looking forward, I arrive at a time of change. Many of you will have heard about IAM RoadSmart’s plans to phase out the Local Observer role in favour of a single National Observer qualification. We are working closely with IAM RoadSmart to understand the implications of this and will explore that in more detail at the Observer Training Day, which will be held at St Crispin’s on Saturday 4 March (08:30 arrival for a 09:00 prompt start – full details posted in Groups.io).

Another initiative we have been working on is to improve the reporting of incidents, whether major or “just a near miss”. We can all learn from each other’s insight and a new online questionnaire will hopefully help capture this. More details in next month’s Slipstream. I think back to a recent near miss of my own: enjoying the A272 heading west towards the junction with the A24. The sun was low in the sky and I was using my forward observation to assess the junction and traffic lights ahead, which had just turned to green. It took me a little longer than it should to realise the car in front had performed a full emergency stop. Fortunately, there was no oncoming traffic and so I was able to safely pass to his offside to avoid a collision. When I stopped, with heart pounding, he pulled alongside me to explain that his daughter had unfastened her safety belt, which he felt justified his actions. I’m not sure I agree but the lesson here is to expect the unexpected and do watch your following distance: two seconds means two seconds and it’s there for a reason.

One final thing. I am not a fan of email as I get hundreds in a day for work and don’t really want to find the same again when I eventually get home. Therefore, if you need to reach me for a swifter reply, please text or WhatsApp me – my number is in the back of Slipstream.

Barrie and I hope to get around all of the local teams over the coming months, to say hello and to take any questions you might have, either on advanced riding or about the wider Club. I look forward to seeing as many of you then as I can and, of course, on the stage at St Crispin’s.

Adrian Ellison
Chief Observer

Barrie Smith Chairman TVAM

From the Chair (January 2023)

Posted on | by Barrie Smith

I’d like to start my piece this month by wishing you all a Happy New Year and I do hope that you had a merry and peaceful Christmas to round off 2022.

As mentioned in my last article in October, the Committee and other volunteer members had been working hard putting together the Annual Report which has since been published on groups.io to all members. I do hope that you have been able to find time to take a look and see how well the Club has done over the past year.

In January we hold our AGM after our monthly Club meeting. This year it will be held on Sunday 15th from 12.30pm – 2pm in the Sixth Form Block at St Crispin’s School. In order to be quorate, we require a minimum of 5% of the membership to either be in attendance or to have submitted their proxy vote to the Committee by the start of the AGM. This is your opportunity to hear about how the Club has performed in the previous year and for the Committee to present their proposals for the coming year. It is also an opportunity for members to vote for the officers of the Committee, for those Committee members being re-elected and on the various resolutions being proposed. Should you wish to submit your proxy vote or register your interest to be elected to one of the officer positions, please visit groups.io where you will find the AGM announcement pinned to the top of the ‘All Members’ area and links to both of the forms.

I very much look forward to seeing many of you at the AGM and a finger buffet will be provided, just in case you needed any more encouragement. This is your Club so please do attend and make your vote count.

Plans for the new riding season are well under way and the Training Team have been busy planning the spring 7Ws event. This event generally kicks off the riding season and is a training weekend in Wales where Associates get priority. We’re awaiting dates to be confirmed by the Metropole in Llandrindod Wells and an announcement will be made soon. Look out for notifications in groups.io coming soon, if not already announced.

Like myself, many of you ride your bikes all year round. Riding in less than perfect conditions is a skill that we should all work on to ensure that we can adequately deal with all conditions. I was lucky enough to be chatting with Alan Thomas at a recent weekend away in Devon. Alan is an IAM examiner, long standing member of TVAM and Rapid Training instructor. It was a particularly moist weekend and some words from our conversation that really struck a chord with me were “we should ride in the wet exactly as we should ride in the dry”. Paying particular attention to the word ‘should’, Alan’s point was that our bikes and tyres are designed to work as well in the wet as they do in the dry, it’s only our ability and fears that make us feel and do things differently. If we keep things smooth and remain able to stop in the distance we can see to be clear then the bike will cope with the conditions.

This brings me nicely onto the fact that Rapid Training offer coached rideouts and development days throughout the winter and TVAM have secured excellent discounts for TVAM members. By using the link on the groups.io ‘Wiki’ in the ‘All Members’ area, you can gain access to these excellent days and other discounts on Rapid Training courses throughout the year. I can happily say that your money will be well spent and you’ll have a fantastic day’s riding.

To finish my piece this month I’d like to talk briefly about a couple of Committee members who have stepped down or are stepping down at the AGM. Firstly, I’d like to mention Alan Hudson, our previous Green Team Leader. Alan stood down in May ’22 after four years in post and whilst leading the Green Team, Alan was an active member of the Committee and instrumental in the creation and running of the pillion rider course. Alan did a good job in the role and is now looking for his next challenge alongside continuing to run the pillion rider course.

Secondly, I’d like to mention Chris Brownlee, our Chief Observer. Chris will be standing down at the AGM as his 5-year tenure is up and constitutionally he must leave his post. Chris took over as Chief Observer in 2018 and has seen the Club through one of the most testing times in its history with the pandemic. As Chair of the Club, I have worked closely with Chris, as did the previous chair Andy Slater, to ensure that we have managed a route through an extremely difficult three years to help keep us all as safe as possible whilst continuing to train as and when we could.

It’s been a pleasure working with both Alan and Chris and I hope that both will remain with the Club for many years to come and share their skills further in other areas of TVAM.

Barrie Smith
TVAM Chair

Chris Brownlee

From The Saddle (November/December 2022)

Posted on | by Chris Brownlee

This will be my last “From the Saddle” article for Slipstream, as I’ll be standing down as Chief Observer at the TVAM AGM in January. TVAM rules mean that the key committee positions can be held for a maximum of five years, and the St. Crispin’s meeting, and AGM, on 15th January will mark the end of my fifth year in this role. That maximum tenure of five years means that people can’t stay in key committee roles for too long and ensures the ongoing input of new people, fresh ideas and renewed impetus. There are too many IAM RoadSmart groups where such time limits are not in place – and it often shows in the lack of dynamism, excitement, and growth in such groups. We do have a candidate for the role of Chief Observer and if you’re interested in standing for this, or any other role on the committee, then do have a word with our Chair, Barrie Smith, who will explain what’s involved and how to submit a nomination.

We completed another of the flagship 7Ws training weekends to Llandrindod Wells in October and despite a doubtful weather forecast most riders got away with no significant rain over the weekend. We have evolved 7Ws to offer the best training and riding experience for Associates and Full Members and we will continue to monitor and evaluate the feedback we receive for the ongoing development of the weekend. 7Ws will continue its focus of being a training weekend with priority for Associates and we also have, of course, the 3Rs training weekend with priority for Full Members. These weekends offer fantastic opportunities for observed rides on some of the best roads available; the development of riding skills is clear to see on the weekends, as well as being great fun. We are very grateful to the organisers, and particularly the participating Observers, for making these weekends possible.

TVAM continues to develop its relationship with Rapid Training. As well as carrying out the TVAM ‘Aardvark’ training for Observers, with a ride out for each Observer every two years, Rapid Training can also offer TVAM members bespoke training, their flagship Bikemaster and Roadmaster courses as well as their various accompanied tours. Rapid Training offers substantial discounts on their courses to TVAM members, for which we’re very grateful. If you’d like to take advantage of these discounts then make sure you use the appropriate link, which you can find on the TVAM Groups.io wiki page; https://tvam.groups.io/g/allmembers/wiki

Autumn riding offers a different experience. Roads are often quieter, the scenery can be spectacular and learning about your riding in more challenging conditions can reap big rewards in terms of skill development. Don’t let your skills fade over the autumn; enjoy the riding and keep up the practice to stay
sharp and build confidence.

It’s been a pleasure and a privilege to act as the Chief Observer for the largest and greatest IAM RoadSmart group, and the best bike club, over the past five years. I’ll still be around, of course, and I’m looking forward to spending more time with you all – out on the bike.

Chris Brownlee
Chief Observer

Barrie Smith Chairman TVAM

From the Chair (October 2022)

Posted on | by Barrie Smith

It’s hard to believe that we have arrived at October already. The year just seems to have flown by and I hope that you have all had the chance to get to experience some of the many Club activities that have been running throughout the riding season.

As October marks the end of the TVAM financial year, the committee’s attention turns
to drafting the Annual Report that goes out to Club members over the winter, ready for the AGM in January. This takes a huge effort from many members, as well as the Committee, as it has to be sent to the Charities Commission to ensure that we meet the aims and objectives of the charity that is TVAM. I thought that I would share a few thoughts with you all for my piece this month.

It’s been another challenging year, in our attempts to get back to the Club’s full package of activities post-Covid. That said, it is in a good position with membership continuing to grow at a sustainable rate and activities for members are building back to pre-Covid levels and higher. The Club’s finances are also in good shape.

We’re continuing to invest in training, as the bedrock of what we do, and developing the Club to provide the social and riding activities for all of our members.

The number of social rides has continued to grow and we now see a huge range of rides that have as few as 2-3 riders and as many as mid 20s. There are many of the old favourite routes being re-introduced as well as many new ones that incorporate new stops for coffee or lunch to cafés and farm shops all over the southern end of the country. Welsh Wanders has once again headed for Wales for their end of summer social riding.

For those that wish to develop their skills, 7Ws, the principal Associate training weekend, ran in April and the relaunch of the 3Rs as a training weekend for Full Members ran in May. The Autumn edition of 7Ws will be taking place as this issue of Slipstream goes to print and will be the final training weekend of the TVAM year. Hopefully more on that in November’s edition.

For our Full Members our Advanced Plus, with an extension into Yorkshire, is working well with lots of Full Members taking advantage of ongoing coaching on their riding. Full Members now have the opportunity to do an Advanced Plus with Hull & East Riding Advanced Motorcyclist (HERAM). Nigel Taylor, HERAM Chief Observer and long-standing member of TVAM is very happy to introduce TVAM Members to the delights of the Yorkshire roads. Have you done one? When was the last time you received some positive input into your riding? It’s as easy as emailing advancedplus@tvam.org to arrange a day in the TVAM area or maybe a couple of days with Nigel in Yorkshire.

I am particularly pleased to see that all of our courses have been able to run at least once this year. Some have clearly been easier to make happen than others, however it is great to see that we have finally been able to re-instate Look Lean Roll to members and we kept going with Advanced Bike Control. BikeCraft made a comeback to a classroom environment, after several successful online versions of the course, and the ‘full’ Observer Core Skills Days returned to enable us to ramp up the number of Observers within the Club. If you’re a Full Member and are interested in becoming an Observer, please email observerinterest@tvam.org and we can arrange a chat with a member of the Training Team and start you on your next journey within TVAM.

We’re progressing well on the project to build a new database function for the Club and this is likely to cost a lot less than we had originally budgeted for.

So that’s a taster of what we’ve been doing and you’ll see more when the Annual Report is issued at the end of the calendar year.

I hope that you all enjoy reading this month’s Slipstream and don’t forget that if you take part in a course, social ride, training event or anything else of a motorcycling nature that you feel you would like to share with your fellow members, please put a short article together and send it to Salli at slipstream@tvam.org so she can include it in a future edition of our excellent monthly magazine.

Barrie Smith

Chairman

Chris Brownlee

From The Saddle (September 2022)

Posted on | by Chris Brownlee

Well, we announced the return of the Look Lean Roll course at our new venue at RAF Benson, and within hours both September and October dates were oversubscribed. Our apologies to all those that wanted to get on this fantastic course and didn’t make it. We’ve only been able to arrange the two dates this year for the course, but the good news is that we expect to run a full complement next year from the Spring. Keep an eye out for announcements and dates – as you can tell, it is very popular.

There is a myriad of courses available to TVAM members, and these courses have been developed largely in-house to meet the needs of our members. We’re very proud of the range and quality of courses that we offer, which are the envy of many other clubs and groups. There hasn’t, to date, been any formal coordination between the courses and
this has led to some differences in the way they address similar issues. We have,
therefore, asked the Training Team to take a ‘review role’ so that we can be ensure that all of our courses are:

  • Accurate in content
  • Use similar techniques when addressing similar issues
  • Have appropriate disclaimers in place
  • Provide adaptable learning environments for the candidates
  • Are safe and appropriate for the candidates and the course leaders

Due to the extensive range of courses it’s not going to be a quick project and we anticipate ongoing involvement of the Training Team in all courses, which should be beneficial for all.

We identified a couple of areas over the summer where we can enhance our guidelines for data protection. This highlighted the need for a more general review of where we hold data, why we’re holding it and what we’re using it for, as well as who has access to it. We’ll be embarking on this review as a new committee project and we’ll keep you appraised as to the changes that we’re making to ensure that we keep everyone’s data secure.

We’re getting close to the TVAM year end at the end of October, so you’ll see the usual flurry of activity as we compile reports, and we start to look at the activities, issues and budgets over the past year, as well as put plans and budgets together for next year. If you have any ideas for activities that you’d like to see next year, then please do let us know.

I hope you’re managing to make the most of good weather and lighter evenings, and enjoying your riding; I know I am.

Chris Brownlee
Chief Observer

Barrie Smith Chairman TVAM

From the Chair (August 2022)

Posted on | by Barrie Smith

As an Associate, you will have heard your Observer say ‘ride for yourself’ on many occasions and always before you have an observed ride or take part in a social ride. It forms a fundamental part of what we do as an advanced rider. It basically means look after yourself and take opportunities for you, not for anyone else.

Many of you will know that I spend a lot of time following Associates as a TVAM Observer. I also spend considerable time following Direct Access Students as a DVSA Approved Instructor, as well as leading social rides for the Club, and I like to think that my riding standard is reasonably high. I therefore take the ‘ride for yourself’ message to mean just that, ride for myself and enjoy the ride. This message came back to me a few weeks ago when I was leading a full day’s ride with a really good group of TVAM friends.

We were doing a long day’s riding and I had split the day up into six stages. On the first stage another Observer, a really good friend of mine who I respect immensely, happened to mention that some of my lines in bends were a little unconventional. I had to admit that one or two were not up to my usual standard. After the first stop we set off again and suddenly I found myself thinking about every bend. Worse, I found myself over thinking every bend and things very soon started to go downhill. My standard of riding was now, in my opinion, awful and when we found a few showers and then a prolonged period of rain I just started to get angry with my riding. This, as you can imagine didn’t help at all and the coffee stop couldn’t come soon enough. Luckily the small group of friends could see my own displeasure and they left me alone for a few minutes to calm down.

Now when I say I was riding badly, I mean that I was not happy with my riding style. I certainly was not dangerous, however I was not as smooth as I usually am. That was enough for me to want to do something to change.

The third stage to lunch was an improvement, although I was still having to think my way through the bends so, after lunch I decided to hand over the leading of the ride to another rider. This was easy as we all had the routes and it gave me an opportunity to sit at the back and just focus on my own riding and get back to enjoying the ride again. This simple change worked brilliantly and during the fifth stage I asked a couple of other riders to sit behind me and give me feedback on what they saw.

By the final stage I was back in front and back to my old self. This is where all the training pays off. With a little nudge from my friends, I was able to recognise that I wasn’t riding as well as usual and with the support of those same friends I was able to do something about it.

I guess the moral of this story is that we need to realise when things are not going as well as they could be and do something about it. I reached out to my peer group and they responded in a supportive manner. TVAM is such a supportive group, we should never be embarrassed to say if we have an issue and ask our friends to give us support and feedback.

This brings me nicely onto a couple of things that I’d like you all to think about – riding standard and incident reporting.

Unfortunately, over the last couple of months, we have had two or three reported instances of poor riding on social rides. This has resulted in members almost leaving the Club and this should never happen. Chris, our Chief Observer, has put a note out to team leaders on groups.io and I’d just like to reiterate that no one should ever feel pressured to ride above the speed limit or indeed their own limits. Social runs should be enjoyable for all, and all levels should be welcomed and included. The marker system allows for a mix of abilities in a ride so there should never be a reason to ride beyond your capabilities to keep up with the rider in front.

We should also feel able to discuss any issues with the run leader and issues should be reported to the Club. There is no such thing as a perfect ride so if you make a mistake then apologise.

TVAM collects data on incidents and these can be reported by the run leader in their social ride report, which must be completed after every TVAM social ride. They can also be reported by using the incident report form. Both forms can be found on the website, under ‘Forms’, at the bottom of each page. The data is kept to enable us to learn and not to name and shame anyone.

That’s enough from me. I hope that you enjoy this month’s edition of Slipstream and are still out enjoying this excellent weather we’re currently experiencing.
Have fun and stay safe everyone.

Barrie Smith

Chairman

Chris Brownlee

From The Saddle (July 2022)

Posted on | by Chris Brownlee

I’m writing this just prior to the Observer Weekend where, as well as riding some great roads in Wales, we’re going to discuss Associate training, giving feedback and updates to the National Observer validation route.

It’s not often I get to make an announcement in this column of this magnitude, but I’m very pleased to be able to announce that we will, after a significant break, be resuming our flagship Look, Lean, Roll course.

We were using the DVSA Motorcycle Manoeuvring Areas (MMAs) for LLR, but access to the MMAs stopped with Covid-19 restrictions and now that the restrictions have been lifted the MMAs are so busy with tests that we are unable to get access. Limitations on numbers that could be on an MMA at any time meant that courses were smaller, and we had to run with two different venues to cater for demand. It is likely, even if we were to get access to the MMAs, that they would also now be too expensive to make the courses worthwhile.

We have, therefore, for some time been searching for a new venue and we’re very pleased that RAF Benson is allowing us access to the helicopter landing area for Look, Lean, Roll.

We still have some issues to iron out, and we have to ‘construct’ the course to fit the new venue, but it is hoped that the new courses will be available later in the summer; keep an eye out on Groups.io for the announcement and how to book a course.

The size of the new venue means that we’ll only need to run one course per month. This means that we only need one LLR team, so we will, therefore, merge the two current teams into one. We’d like to say a huge ‘thank you’ to Mel Hakhnazarian for setting up the extra LLR team and running the LLR courses at Greenham.

Many of you will be aware of Rapid Training, who offer advanced riding skills and also carry out our Observer riding skills checks every two years. Rapid Training has put significant effort into developing its courses over the past couple of years and we’re keen to develop our relationship with them.

We’re very pleased to be able to announce, therefore, that Rapid Training is offering a significant discount on its courses to TVAM members. As well as a 10% discount there are deeper discounts on their flagship courses such as Bikemaster and Roadmaster. Hopefully by the time this goes to print you’ll have seen the
discount codes etc. on Groups.io.

We’re very grateful to Rapid Training for these discounts and we hope that TVAM members will take advantage of the fantastic training and trips that Rapid Training offer.

So a great month from a training perspective, with training updates for Associates, Full Members and Observers.

Here’s to a great summer of riding!

Chris Brownlee
Chief Observer

Barrie Smith Chairman TVAM

From the Chair (June 2022)

Posted on | by Barrie Smith

I’m writing this having just returned from an amazing weekend away in Wales with the Club. We re-launched 3Rs as a training weekend specifically for Full Members with the aim of providing a balanced weekend of social riding and training and what an incredible weekend it turned out. It involved 30 people, with a mix of 10 Observers and 20 Full Members. As recently with 7Ws we stayed at the Metropole Hotel in Llandrindod Wells, a place that the Club knows really well, as we wanted to go to an area where we knew the roads and quality of accommodation.

We met at The Wandering Kitchen in Wallingford for breakfast and a briefing, before three social rides set off to Wales. Led by Jeremy Davies, Salli Griffith and Simon Whatley, they all took completely different routes to our destination for the weekend. Thanks to the three of them for arranging these rides.

The Saturday introduced the training element for the weekend and saw us split into groups of three, with one Observer and two Full Members to carry out an Advanced Plus style ride for the day. I worked with two members who both wanted to develop their ability to maintain their pace, where safe to do so, in bends. We started by taking a look at where they sat in comparison to the IAM RoadSmart test standard and then built from that position. We worked on scanning the road, best positioning for the bend and developing our throttle sense. Both developed well and our key learning point was ‘read the road, don’t just ride it’.

On the Sunday, the majority of people selected a ride to return them back to a choice of finishing points. Tom Gray lead a run back to Blackbushe, Paul Kilby lead a run back to Marlow and I led a run back to Bracknell/Wokingham. It was great to see and hear about the excellent riding standard on the rides back as well as the whole weekend.

3Rs appears to have been a great success and I’d like to pass on my thanks to the organisation team of Tom Gray, Nina Bosley-Gray and Paul Kilby. They did a great job of organising and running the weekend and made it seamless and enjoyable for all who attended. I’d also like to thank all of the Observers for their efforts in putting together routes and development sessions for the benefit of the Full Members. Finally, I’d like to thank the Full Members for embracing the weekend and being open to learning on the Saturday and generally putting into practice what they had worked on. I’m already looking forward to the next one.

The Calendar is getting full of riding opportunities for all members within the Club this year. All local teams are regularly offering social rides and any
member can join these by becoming a member of that group on groups.io and then putting their name onto the database or RSVP event for the ride.

Associates looking for rides could consider the training runs (T-runs) that are being advertised by the local teams. These are designed to give Associates coaching sessions on their riding in an informal manner. The runs generally comprise an Associate, or two, riding with an Observer and then receiving verbal feedback on their riding without the formality of a run report form. Some T-runs use a starburst approach and others carry out observed sessions within a larger ride. Most T-runs offer a social ride in the afternoon to allow Associates the opportunity to practice what they have worked on in the morning
sessions. Keep an eye out in Slipstream and on the calendar and event reminder on groups.io for further information about these.

Unfortunately, we have had to cancel the Austin Vince seminar event for June due to a low take up. This may well be down to the fact that members are out riding in the lovely evenings that the summer season brings, so we’ll look to set another date in the future, perhaps when the evenings draw in, to enable members to come and listen to Austin’s enthusiasm of all adventures on two-wheels!

Whatever you’re doing this month, enjoy the good weather and your riding.

Barrie Smith

Chairman

Chris Brownlee

From The Saddle (May 2022)

Posted on | by Chris Brownlee

The improvement in weather over the last month or two has seen a welcome increase in our riding activities – and also more bike traffic on the roads. We encourage everyone to ride appropriately at all times and bear in mind that other road users can see how we ride and may comment if our riding is not appropriate.

In April we held the latest incarnation of our flagship training weekend, the 7Ws. In response to feedback from previous weekends we made some changes to this 7Ws:

  • We changed the start point to the Wandering Kitchen at Berinsfield. The café opened early especially for us and provided everyone with bacon, sausage, egg and hash brown baps, pastries, teas and coffees – all very efficiently. The change in start point meant a wider choice of routes to leave Oxfordshire.
  • We changed venue to the Metropole Hotel in Llandrindod Wells. After several years at the Commodore Hotel (also in Llandrindod Wells), we couldn’t get the dates we wanted, so we thought we’d try the Metropole which we’ve used for the Observer Weekend for many years. We hoped the higher prices would be justified by more comfort, better facilities and better food.
  • We opted to use smaller groups of two Associates and one Observer to get to Wales on the Friday, rather than the larger social runs, as well as retaining this format for the Saturday sessions too. This provides Associates with more opportunities to read the road and ride for themselves, as well as being more flexible. Full Members were catered for with runs in smaller groups of up to six, with optional observation.

We’re very pleased with the feedback that we have received on the weekend which has, with one or two small exceptions, been universally supportive of the changes. We will, therefore, be retaining these changes for forthcoming 7Ws weekends.

I’d like to thank the Training Team for taking on the organisation of 7Ws, moving the weekend to a new format and making it such a success. Do read the article (page 8 Slipstream May 2022) to find out more about 7Ws from the perspective of an Observer, an Associate and a Full Member.

I’m very pleased to announce that Sam Grant has joined the TVAM Training Team. Sam brings a wealth of business process experience to the team and, as an Associate, will be able to contribute directly to the development of our revised Associate Training Programme.

Some Full Members have been getting out early on the Advanced Plus rides that we offer – and you can sign up for these at the Green Team desk at
St. Crispin’s, as well as online. We’re pleased to be able to offer an extension of this with Advanced Plus rides now available in Yorkshire, courtesy of our very own Nigel Taylor. There’s a short article on page 7 (Slipstream May 2022) about how this works and how to book up. I’m sure this will be a popular extension to our Advanced Plus
programme.

Here’s to a great summer of riding!

Chris Brownlee
Chief Observer

Barrie Smith Chairman TVAM

From the Chair (April 2022)

Posted on | by Barrie Smith

I’m sorry that I was not able to be at St Crispin’s in March. Hev and I were in the Caribbean celebrating a significant wedding anniversary. I have to say, it was a shock walking off the plane at 7am in Gatwick with the outside air temperature of -2°C, when we had left Antigua a few hours earlier at +28°C! That said, the weather since has been positively balmy and the number of bikes out enjoying the dry roads is really encouraging to see.

I am told that the number of motorcycles at St Crispin’s in March was 296, which is the second highest meeting number since we started keeping records of attendance and a record for March. Whether it was just the good weather or you just fancied a ride out on your bike, thank you to all that came along and I hope that you had a great day.

At this time of year we see large numbers of motorcyclists, many of whom have not been out for many months, and we have all seen those that clearly have not been coached in advanced riding. We tend to hear more conversations about (and please excuse the terminology) ‘boy racers’ hooning around and giving motorcycling and motorcyclists a bad name. It’s very easy for all motorcyclists to be labelled the same and it’s therefore even more important for us all to remember to ride to the TVAM/IAM RoadSmart standards, at all times, and show a good example to all other road users.

The calendar in Slipstream is filling up nicely with more and more social rides, many being put on regularly by the seven social groups, and many more being done by various members for the enjoyment of all. It’s great to see rides of 15-20 riders getting out, riding and socialising for whole days, as well as the smaller rides of between 5 and 10 riders who may be out for a shorter time.

If you are thinking of taking part in any of these organised rides, please ensure that you arrive in plenty of time for the briefing and always remember to ride in a manner that is not going to give cause for complaint from your fellow riders or members of the public. We have various categories of ride and therefore the briefing will vary for the type of ride you’re attending. The run leader and back-marker will have worked hard to put the ride together, so please do listen to the briefing carefully.

If you do take part in a social ride and you’ve had fun, why not write about it, add a few photographs and send it to Salli at slipstream@tvam.org so it can be shared with the membership. You could also consider sharing the route for others to enjoy.

Talking of group rides, by the time you read this the 41st running of the 7Ws will have taken place. This is the pinnacle training weekend for Associates in the Club to head to Wales for some great coaching on outstanding roads. I’m sure that next month’s Slipstream will be full of photographs of happy-faced riders having enjoyed the trip away.

As usual 7Ws was over subscribed and, because priority is given to Associates, it meant that we could not take as many Full Members as we have done before. For this reason we launched 3Rs as a training weekend with priority given to Full Members, and this will take place in May. The team have put a fantastic long weekend together, with a balance of social runs and training runs for all to enjoy. We have limited this to a total of 30 people and it was again over subscribed. If you have missed out on this occasion for either of these trips, then details of future trips will be posted in Slipstream and on groups.io as soon as we can secure dates.

March saw the first of our evening seminars, held at the Masonic Hall in Wokingham. Hev Smith, our friendly Club Paramedic, hosted an informative evening about what to do if you’re first to arrive at the scene of an incident. Hev started the seminar by getting people into groups and setting the scene of a road traffic incident and told them that they were the first people to arrive. They had to think about what they would do and every few minutes she would add something to the scenario. This was clever because it got the room talking and getting to know each other a little. Hev then went through with the groups the sorts of things they had considered and there was some good open discussion about the importance of keeping themselves safe and managing the scene to assist anyone that was injured and preserve the scene should investigation be required. The second part of the session talked about some basics to look for and deal with in order to preserve life. DRScABC is something that will now hopefully stick in the minds of the 32 members at the event. A huge thanks to Hev for giving the presentation, Michael Hattey for being an excellent patient and to WOBMOB for hosting the event.

We are hoping that there will be 7 of these events throughout the year, each one hosted by a different social group. We want to host events that the members want, so if you have a suggestion then talk to your social team leader and they can bring it to the committee. Seminars can be hosted within your social group location and we just ask that they are motorcycle related and are open to all Club members. BAR are hosting an evening with Austin Vince, on the 15th June, and you can read more about that in this issue.

Finally, if you’re an Associate and would like to know what to expect on your test, or an Observer and to want to know a little more about the test process, the Committee will be hosting a ‘Meet the Examiner’ evening at the Masonic Hall in Wokingham in late April/early May. Details will be coming out to all members on groups.io shortly.

Have fun and stay safe everyone.

Barrie Smith

Chairman

Chris Brownlee

From The Saddle (March 2022)

Posted on | by Chris Brownlee

I’m writing this at the end of February, when the formal restrictions around Covid-19 have just been relaxed. Of course, we’ve been able to carry out observed rides and social rides for some time, and we are hopeful that the reduced restrictions will continue to make organising social events easier and less stressful. We’ll keep you posted as to any changes that may be required, and we would encourage anyone that wants to continue with personal measures to keep themselves safe to do so.

I was very pleased to see a return of the 3Rs weekends, particularly given its focus as a training weekend. What is very welcome is the focus of the weekend on Full Member training. Emulating the very popular 7Ws weekend, which is aimed at providing a weekend’s training for Associates, the 3Rs will be providing informal observed rides for Full Members across a weekend – on this occasion based in Llandrindod Wells. Although this first weekend is fully booked, we are hopeful that we will be able to arrange further weekends to provide more opportunities for Full Member training.

One of the reasons the 7Ws and 3Rs weekend book up so quickly is the popularity of our electronic communications platform, Groups.io. We wanted to remind everyone that Groups.io offers the following advantages over other unofficial ones:

  • Groups.io has only TVAM members, so you can be sure that when you’re using Groups.io everyone in the group is a TVAM member. We automatically add people when they join TVAM, and we remove them when they leave.
  • There are no adverts or tracking cookies.
  • You can choose to have messages delivered by email, with different delivery options, so you don’t have to log into the website (although it’s even better if you do).
  • All communication on Groups.io is private to the group. The settings we use mean that other search engines can’t see the content, so it’s only available to members.

If you’re stuck how to use Groups.io, check out the Wiki at https://tvam.groups.io/g/ allmembers/wiki or, if you’re really stuck, drop the admin a note at groups.io@tvam.org

As the weather starts to improve, more members are looking to organise overseas trips, which is great. We’d like to remind everyone that if you’re organising a trip that might involve a ‘package,’ such as an hotel and sea crossing, the club has guidelines in place to prevent the organiser or the club being liable under the Package Travel Directive, which is a European-wide directive designed to protect those taking package holidays and ensure repatriation is covered if required. If you’re planning an overseas trip then you need to inform the committee about your trip and explain how you’re avoiding the terms of the Package Travel Directive, or involve a travel agent. The club has an appointed travel agent for this very purpose – https://tvam.notjusttravel.com

We can’t just “club together and run our own overseas trips” any more if we’re to ensure that the organisers and club do not become liable under the Package Travel Directive, so do let the committee know about any overseas trips in good time.

I’m looking forward to taking advantage of more relaxed Covid-19 guidelines both in the UK and Europe this year, so hope to see you on a trip or a run.

Best wishes

Chris Brownlee
Chief Observer

Barrie Smith Chairman TVAM

From the Chair (February 2022)

Posted on | by Barrie Smith

I’m writing this after arriving home from leading Barrie’s Bimble to the Haven Café, Salisbury. I found out on Monday 24th that they were closing down on 31st January and just couldn’t resist putting together one last bimble to this excellent independent café. I limited the ride to 20 bikes and it filled up within 48hrs. Hopefully one of my fellow bimblers will be kind enough to share the experience here in a future issue.

After St Crispin’s in January we held the AGM. I am grateful to the 52 Members that physically attended the meeting in the sixth form block at St Crispin’s and helped us to eat the food provided. Thank you also to the 48 Members that felt confidence in the Committee and gave us their proxy votes for the meeting.

I’m pleased to report that the minutes of last year’s AGM and the Annual Report for 2020-21 were approved unanimously and the members of the Committee, that were remaining in post, were all duly elected unanimously.

After five years as Club Secretary, Adrian Ellison has stood down and Ian Gaitley has been elected into the role. Whilst Ian has some huge shoes to fill, the Committee is extremely happy that Ian has stepped up to the position and we know that he will have Adrian’s assistance getting up to speed. Adrian has done a huge amount to ensure that the Club has both developed and not fallen foul of the numerous rules and regulations that can so easily trip up a charity such as TVAM.

After four years as our Events Coordinator, Phil Donovan has stepped down. Phil has enthusiastically put on events for our members and a change in his career means that he does not have as much time to devote to the role as he has had in the past.

As at the AGM, I’d like to publicly thank both Adrian and Phil for the efforts that they have put into TVAM for the benefit of all of our members. Both Adrian and Phil received the traditional glass tankards that are given to Committee Members when they stand down.

At the AGM the Committee outlined our objectives for 2022. Some things have continued, as we’ve been a little restricted over the past two years by the pandemic, such as promoting the RideUP scheme, strengthening our links with other road safety charities and continuing to recognise our most active members.

We really want our members to share their experiences, good and bad. Salli is always happy to receive articles about your activities, in order that they may be shared with our membership in Slipstream (slipstream@tvam.org). We also really want to know when things don’t go quite to plan. We appreciate that some
incidents can be a little embarrassing for individuals, however reporting of these enables us to identify where we may wish to strengthen our training for the benefit of all members. An example of this is the Machine Handling course, which was developed to help people with moving their bikes around manually without dropping them. We’re not looking to name and shame, we just want the opportunity to learn. Don’t be too proud to share and ask for help.

The vast majority of you will have heard of, and have likely experienced, our excellent 7W’s training weekends that take place twice a year and focus on training for Associates with a combination of observed and social rides over three days. Well, we now want to run a similar training weekend with the focus being on Full Members that wish to hone their skills. I am pleased to announce that we’re re-launching our 3R’s weekends, which we want to run primarily as a training weekend for our green badge Members. Full details of the weekend will be issued shortly and we hope that this will become another regular event
in the annual calendar, a couple of times a year.

Membership events are also changing. The Committee wish to reach out to the seven Social Groups, that make up TVAM, and ask them for ideas of the types of seminars they wish to have throughout spring and autumn. It’s fair to say that the local teams know their members the best and we’re wanting each team to take ownership of one of our seminars per year. That doesn’t mean being left to deal with the event yourselves, merely coming up with an idea or a contact that could put on a talk to a larger group of enthusiastic motorcyclists. These could be in your social area or at a central location. Please speak to your Team Leader if you have an idea and they can bring it to the Committee for the support needed to get it running. We’re hoping for a seminar each month in March to June and September to November.

We’re starting in March with a seminar hosted by WOBMOB and open to all members within the Club. This will be a talk by Hev Smith, our resident paramedic, about what you should do if you arrive first on scene at a road traffic collision. This will be held at the Masonic Hall in Wokingham and is planned to be an interactive evening – depending on your participation – whereby you will leave far more informed than you may be now. Look out on Groups.io for details coming soon.

I’m excited about the coming year and the things that we have planned already for the benefit of all members. I hope that you enjoy reading this month’s edition of Slipstream and very much look forward to seeing many of you at the various evening seminars, training weekends and out on the road generally over the coming year.

Have fun and stay safe everyone.

Barrie Smith

Chairman

Chris Brownlee

From The Saddle (January 2022)

Posted on | by Chris Brownlee

And Happy New Year to everyone.

Firstly, I’d like to remind everyone that our Annual General Meeting (AGM) will be held on Sunday 16th January at 12.30pm. At the time of writing, we hope to hold the AGM as a face-to-face meeting at St. Crispin’s. We are continuing to evaluate the Covid-19 risks and guidelines and if conditions deem it appropriate then we will move this to an online meeting.

The ongoing monitoring of the guidelines and rules around Covid-19 will also be used to inform any restrictions we might place around our social and riding activities. I’m writing this on New Year’s Eve and there are currently no formal guidelines or rules in place in England that mean we need to restrict our activities – although this may have already changed by the time you’re reading this article. We do urge members to keep themselves safe and to take appropriate individual measures. We will keep everyone informed as to any restrictions that we, the government or IAM RoadSmart decide to implement, so please keep an eye out for any relevant messages on Groups.io.

One of our flagship training events, the 7Ws weekend, continues to evolve. Started many years ago under the leadership of Daf Phillips, we held the 40th 7Ws last September. Ness and Andy Boudier organised a very successful celebratory event, with a great mix of observed runs, social runs and social interaction – as well as raising a whopping £464 for the Air Ambulance (which receives no public funding) via contributions and a raffle. Due to family and business pressures, they have decided to step back from 7Ws and the organisation is now with the Training Team; we’d like to say a big “thank you” to Ness and Andy. Details of the 41st 7Ws, to be held on 8th-10th April 2022 and based in Llandrindod Wells (where else?) are now on the Groups.io calendar. Although some things have evolved, the core aims of 7Ws as a training weekend, aimed at Associates, and enjoying great riding on some fabulous Welsh roads, remain the same. See the calendar entry on Groups.io for more information or scan QR code to register your interest.

The local teams have been organising some fantastic runs in the lead-up to Christmas and over the New Year break. It’s great to see so many getting engaged
on these runs despite some less-than-ideal weather. The team leaders will be taking more steps to increase engagement and will also be taking the lead on driving TVAM involvement at local events. Please ensure you engage with your local team and get along to the team meetings and social runs. The local teams are really the heart of the club and so much of the social and riding activity is driven from the local team members.

Although we’ve had some unseasonably warm weather over New Year (the warmest on record), and the evenings are starting to get lighter, please do keep an eye out for cold snaps, icy patches and micro-climates. It’s sometimes better to delay going out for an hour or two than to risk encountering frost or ice. We have better weather to look forward to and I hope to see you on a ride soon.

Best wishes

Chris Brownlee
Chief Observer

Chris Brownlee

December St. Crispin’s Announcement

Posted on | by Chris Brownlee

Hi everyone

With the recent change in government guidelines to ‘Plan B’, the increasing concern over the rising number of Covid cases, and its closeness to Christmas, the Committee has decided that we should move the December meeting from face-to-face at St. Crispin’s to a virtual online meeting.  We understand that this may be disappointing, but we feel that it is the responsible thing to do.

We will, therefore, hold an online meeting from 9am to 10am on Sunday morning and there will be no face-to-face meeting at St. Crispin’s in December.

We hope that we can meet face to face again for our January meeting, and for our AGM, on 16th January and we will keep you informed about this.

We look forward to ‘seeing’ as many of you as possible for our online meeting on Sunday morning, when we’ll have lots of Full Member qualifications to announce.

We’ll keep you posted as to further changes as we can and, in the meantime, we wish you all a peaceful, happy and safe Christmas and New Year.

 

Best wishes

 

Chris Brownlee                                       Barrie Smith

Chief Observer                                       Chair