-Ralph-

Anyone done this?

I'm doing ROSPA training at the moment, and the group are great, they go about it in the right way, and even as an experienced rider I'm learning some good stuff.

You do have to take away from it what you want to take away from it though.

I was a fairly advanced rider before I started (certainly not dangerous and very rarely have dodgy 'moments' when I'm riding - the more of these 'moments' you have, the more likely that one day soon, one of them is going to develop into an accident)

So I'm now at the stage of being past all the basics and just getting my riding 'refined' for the test.

There's a fair bit of stuff which I just don't see the value in, and you think, this isn't about safety, I'm just doing this to please the guy riding along behind me.

Stuff like exaggerating your head movements (nodding dog) so the guy behind can see that you've checked your mirrors. So long as I've taken a good view in my mirror and got all the information available from that, what does it matter how much I've moved my head?

I'm also finding very difficult and frustrating to deal with not exceeding the speed limits, at all, ever. For instance not being able to overtake a car that's doing 58mph. Again, I'm only doing that in order that I pass the test.

I'm also struggling with 'Sparkle'. Yesterday I was told that to get Gold level on my test, I need to show more 'Sparkle' and the example used was the observer was leaving me behind out of corner exits, because he was going in with a lower gear, and so getting more response when he cracked the throttle open on corner exits. I was quite happy with the progress I was making, I don't care if somebody else is quicker than me, and 'Sparkle' does nothing to improve my safety. It's just vanity, and 'looking good for the examiner'.

I rode home from my ROSPA ride yesterday, wondering whether I should tell them that I'm doing the training to make myself safer, and I'm not bothered about the badge, and have decided that I'm never actually going to do the test.

That way my observed rides can just be about ironing out anything I'm doing that's dangerous or bad practice, they will still be at the speed limits, just not pedantically so, and I won't have to bother with whether or not what I'm doing will please an examiner.

'Your examiner won't like that', isn't really the feedback I'm looking for, it's not why I'm doing it. I'd rather the observer was only concentrating on things that make me safer.

Any thoughts?