Dorset Police
You are here: BikeSafe / Dorset
The county of Dorset offers some of the best scenery and riding anywhere in the UK. With no motorway network to spoil your enjoyment of road riding we have the historic Jurassic coast and a county that is still mostly rural. Outside of the Bournemouth/Poole conurbation this allows the motorcyclist to enjoy the very best of the British countryside with many good quality A, B and unclassified roads to challenge and enthuse the rider. Whether it is the breathtaking views on the Coast Road or the famous bends of Zig Zag Hill Dorset has something for every rider and machine.
But all this can come at a price with bikes sharing the same roads as cars, buses, trucks and caravans, especially so in the summer months. Sadly many bikers are caught out each year on our roads. And while the number of bike journeys are low compared to our four wheeled friends the risk of having a bike accident is still statistically high.
It doesn’t matter how you look at it or view the figures most of our serious bike accidents occur as a result of rider error. It might be going too fast for the circumstances, riding too close or making a bad decision, like overtaking when its not safe to do so. If you knew what might happen, you wouldn’t do it!
You can help yourself and take steps to prevent becoming a statistic by taking further training and learning how to ride a road that offers more than a straight or the odd roundabout. This is what BikeSafe Dorset is all about.
We offer riders in Dorset the opportunity to have their riding observed by one of our Police Class 1 motorcyclists with the aim of identifying areas of risk and helping you to improve your riding and make you a safer motorcyclist. Dorset Police also welcome many thousands of bikers each week to one of the largest weekly biking events in Europe, Poole Quay Dream Machines every Tuesday night between April and September. This is run in partnership with Poole Tourism (Dream Machines Website) and a dedicated team of volunteer marshals.
Although we operate a soft policing touch we will always prosecute those that risk themselves, others and the event by dangerous or inappropriate riding. We always have motorcycle officers on duty at the Quay (and often at other venues) in support of the marshals that are happy to deal with any enquires. If you see us come up and ask about BikeSafe Dorset and biking, you’ll find we know what we are talking about. As we say in Police rider training ‘Keep it on the black stuff’ and Safe Riding.
Workshop content
Dorset BikeSafe runs workshops throughout the riding season from April to September. Each year we run a number of workshops open to all full bike licence holders who are looking to sharpen their skills and become better riders. These should not be members of Advanced Riding Groups as although we would very much like to work with all riders, there are only a limited number of places and these are therefore reserved for those who do not have membership of an advanced group.
Our workshops are held at convenient locations around the county so check the booking section for a workshop near you. They are broken into two parts. The Saturday will involve the theory of advanced riding given in a relaxed environment led by a Police Bike Instructor. It is a day inside preparing you for the road on day two. They will cover the skills you need and the how’s and where’s of bike accidents and problems. They should open your eyes to safer riding and make you think about your place on the road and how you manage the road space around you. There is no such thing as the perfect rider, you can always learn more and be better. Our work is supported by Poole, Bournemouth & Dorset council’s and with their help we have managed to reduce the cost of our workshops.
This will be followed by the chance to take a 2 hour riding assessment with a BikeSafe observer the day after (Sunday). We ride real bikes on real roads in real situations and plan routes to take in all the various road conditions that you might find in our county. Our observer knows how bike accidents happen, we are the people that go to them. So we can use this experience to help you. We can identify where you might be going wrong and what you can do to improve your safety and riding on our roads.
BikeSafe works. It helps you understand how to improve in these areas: safer use of road space, better management of hazards, smoother progress, safer overtaking, more enjoyment of riding, saves you fuel, as you use the bike the way you should, less wear and tear on your machine, cheaper insurance and, as a gateway into further training.
