Riding Instructor - Philip McDaid (Chief Instructor, www.riderskills.co.nz)
Having had some time away from riding, and recent surgery I looked for an instructor who could assess my riding. Philip was recommended by a poster here who’s a IAM observer.
Philip’s riding school is in Westgate Auckland. I live in Hamilton which is about an hour and a half away. The advanced roadcraft which he teaches is one-on-one coaching. You can either do a half day or full day of training with each session being started off with a 90 minute assessment ride. I spent a total of 3 days over the course of a month with Philip.
For this coaching you need a full license and you must have your own bike. On a full day session expect to ride in excess of 200K.
Although I have had a license for many years I found the sessions challenging with Philip working with you in a mix environment (country roads, city riding, built up urban roads, motorways etc). The focus of these sessions is defensive riding and risk assessment. Two way helmet intercoms are used and Philip also has a camera.
I enjoyed my time with Philip, he is very patient and an expert in police roadcraft riding. The sessions focused on areas I could improve on after each assessment and there was a strong emphasis on observation skills. Being followed by a instructor assessing how you ride is quite a learning experience. The one-on-one sessions meant we only focused on areas relevant to my riding which made every minute productive for me.
Although I have held a license for many years (both car & motorcycle) and I have done defensive driving several times I was probably only picking up 10% of what Philip was seeing as risks or information on the roads. I also purchased a copy of roadcraft from the UK TSO. Having Philip explain topics covered in this book and then riding following these discussions gave a lot of insight into my riding. The sections on limit point assessment need to be learnt with the help of an instructor.
Between sessions to get the most out of the coaching you need to ride every day and I feel after the three sessions I’m more aware of what is happing around me. I’m also more aware of areas I can improve in my riding.
The session is run despite weather conditions, for one of my sessions it was raining, another we had strong cross winds and wet roads to contend with. Although it’s nice to ride when the weather is good, it’s not always that way so having the sessions during the less than ideal riding conditions was good.
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