what are you doing in Aberdeen? I thought you were foreign?

I got that on the way up to Ipswich tonight - I’m doing the speed which is safe and less damaging to the car. Anyone who has driven on the A12 will know that after Hatfield Peveral, it gets a bit rustic. I get tailgaters wanting to either push past or get me to go faster. I know the road – I know that that particular stretch is a death trap. I also know that there is heavy traffic ahead, so going faster will just get me closer to it. Eventually they got past me, and had to slow down.

Different story on the way home - the road was empty, take car up to 70, flip on cruise control and enjoy the ride.

I will say that I get less idiots trying to bully me out of the way in the Crossfire than I did in the Skoda.

Cripes - is that the time?

Gah!

Every time I head up to brum in the evening/night, this happens. On the A34 which is a dual carriageway. Even worse is when they overtake whilst on a hill!!!

Though I've also seen old fogies overtake at similarly low speeds. In cars at least, you should overtake with good speed. A few weeks back, on motorway. Left lane clear. Middle lane one car, sitting at 65mph!!! Being overtaken by a car at (seemingly) 66mph. I zoomed up behind them and decided to undertake the lot. As soon as I'd undertaken the middle car, it moved over to the left! Moron!

People fast asleep in the middle lane do annoy me. Even when there's nothing for miles either way, you still find them there... plodding along in the middle of the road for absolutely no reason

I'd never undertake though. I make a point of changing from lane one to lane 3 and then back again right in front. If that's not possible, then I sit patiently behind the guy in the outside and quietly imagine boiling them alive in acid.

I think it depends on car. In my old car, I'd be more cautious about undertaking. In the new one, I could undertake both cars and see them for dust. If I wanted.

I keep getting tailgated by guys in Audi A4 Tdi's, one even flashed me the other week and pointed at me as he overtook me. He then proceeded to stop at an Esso garage, so I thought I would go have a 'word'. He was a cocky looking very gaunt looking bloke who obviouslt felt he had made it in life. I tapped on his window and he would not even acknowledge me, stared straight ahead, so I sat on his bonnet and looked at him for a bit. I got bored after a while. What makes people think they are Chuck Norris when they are in their car is totally beyond me.

I'm not foreign. I was born in Englandshire, part of the [dis-]United Kingdom still.

Aberdeen Overdrive is a term from the halcyon days of British lorryists in the 1940s and 1950s. Back then, lorries were limited to 20mph - yes, really - chiefly because of p!ss poor brakes and dodgy tyres. As I understand it, there's a nice long hill on the main drag into Aberdeen, and drivers used to knock into neutral and let gravity help a bit.

I have a sense that's what's happening on the M2 down into the Medway Valley. Rather than lumber along at 60-ish, the driver knocks out of gear and sticks his feet up on the dash - it's a good few miles before he needs to re-engage gear and use some power for the drag up the other side.

Had a Dutch one hogging lane two today.

Spot on about the A12 (nightmare road) and your right about the Skoda effect, my main problem is BMW's they will go out of their way and to any speed to prove they have more right in the right hand lane than I do... gets quite comical sometimes.

I travel the M1 & A/M42 daily, I'm only on the M1 for 10-15 minutes and since most of that time everyone is on skinny lanes and a 50mph speed limit it's not too bad. The longest portion of the A42 is dual carriageway only, so you get the odd idiot who thinks it's his right to run it at upwards of 80-90mph, sometimes I make a special point of pulling out to overtake something before they get to me so it forces them to find their brake pedal at least twice during their journey, but mostly I judge it so I can wait until they've gone zooming past before I pull out.

The infuriating part is the bit from Junction 8 to Junction 4 (where I get off) which is 4 lanes when the hard shoulder is in use as a congestion lane. It's understood (from the matrix signs if nothing else) that the hard shoulder lane is only to be used by the people getting off at the next junction, that lane is then "X"d out until the new traffic joins from that junction.

Mostly I've changed into the hard shoulder lane right from when the Junction 5 traffic joins, so I don't get caught up in any delays on the main carriageway, there is almost always at least a 60mph speed limit and for the mostpart the system works really well, people know there are cameras (which work) and they don't take the proverbial. Last night I was driving (on cruise control) at 60mph about 2 cars lengths from a silver Volkswagon something-or-other and we were still a good 1/4 mile from the junction, we were moving faster than the traffic on the main carriageway and the car infront of me passed on the inside of a big black landrover-y type thing. I was just moving up to do the same when all of a suddent eh driver of the landrover-y type thing pulled into our lane, between us, completely cutting off my braking distance and forcing me to slow down suddenly I flashed and hooted at him, and he flipped me the bird!! Cheeky Barsteward!!

It turned out he came off at the junction and I had to follow him until Hockley Heath when he turned off into the mega-posh-more-money-than-sense houses!! Typical.

It's that kind of blatant idiocy that bothers me on the roads.

Another pet hate of mine is where the hard shoulder is open for use and people dawdle in the nearside lane thinking they're not allowed to use it.

Peter.