A SHOCKING video shows the moment an angry van man launched a foul-mouthed tirade against a cyclist trying to dodge potholes.
The dashcam footage shows the cyclist using the centre of the road as he tries to dodge dozens of defects.
A blue transit van races past beeping its horn before the driver stops at a roundabout and unleashes a tirade of swearing, including calling Rob Earl a “f****** mongo”.
The scene was recorded in Edinburgh, which has is notorious for the poor state of its roads, even drawing comparisons with the third world.
Although the thousands of potholes in the city regularly damage cars, they can throw cyclists from the saddle resulting in serious and even fatal injury.
The video, filmed earlier this week and obtained by campaigning website Scotland’s Worst Drivers, stars with a backwards-facing camera on Rob’s bike.
It shows the driver of the blue van race up from behind and then overtake at speed, beeping his horn.
Seconds later, Rob draws up to the van and can be heard politely explaining: ”There are massive holes.”
The driver sticks his head out of the window and rants: “Get to the f****** side of the road you f****** mongo. F ****** idiot.”
Despite the abuse, the cyclist just continues to say “massive holes, massive holes”.
Rob said: “The oncoming lane was completely free for overtaking as he demonstrated. He wasn’t held up at all and he still drove aggressively and got so angry he had to stop for a shout.”
Sam Jones, Campaigns Coordinator at Cycling UK, said: “Poor road surfacing and the threat of being knocked off your bike by a car door suddenly opening will often see cyclists take up what is known as the ‘primary position’ ie close to the centre of the lane.
“For drivers not aware of the advice in the Highways Code for cyclists, this might be seen as antagonistic, when the cyclist is merely trying to keep both themselves safe and prevent an accident.
“The fact that drivers frequently misconstrue perfectly safe cycling in this way is worrying and all too frequent, resulting in intimidating behaviour such as in this video. Cycling UK believes this could be addressed by making cycle awareness more prominent within the driving test.”
A spokesman for Scotland’s Worst Drivers said: “If a cyclist hits a pothole and falls off their bike, there is the potential danger of being hit by the vehicle behind, causing even more delays and road closures.
“I think if this van driver is as angry as he seems to be, he needs to calm down and understand road rage is not something we need on our roads.
“Perhaps he should contact the City of Edinburgh Council and report the state of this road and explain that he was held up for all of three seconds and they should resurface this road as matter of urgency.
“To be honest he spent more time stopped on the roundabout having a one-way shouting match with the cyclist.”
Earlier this year councillors branded Edinburgh’s roads “the worst they had ever been” and urged the council to get them fixed.
In 2012, a Scottish tour provider revealed that tourists from third world countries had claimed that Edinburgh’s roads were worse than back home.
Fabien Chornogubsky, who works with a tour company called Escocia, said: “Almost everyone I’ve taken on tours recently has commented on the appalling state of the roads in Edinburgh, even people from Third World countries.”
In January, Tory MP Andrew Jones estimated that 211 cyclists had been killed in the UK as a result of defective road surfaces between 2010 and 2011.
In 2011, Martyn Uzzell, 51, was killed in North Yorkshire during a cycle from Land’s End to John O’Groats, when he went over a four-inch-deep pothole that had been inspected and ignored by the local council a month before.
