How often do you read about people getting hit by a car while walking, or while driving? If someone gets hit you'll hear about it, but you won't hear any specific mention of the untold thousands, if not millions, of times someone makes a journey and arrives at their destination without incident.

You're most likely to get hit by a car if the driver didn't see you, misjudged what you were going to do, or didn't care that you were in the way.

Not Being Seen is something you can go a long way to prevent. Assuming the driver is actually looking at the road (which I know some don't because they are too busy texting or whatever) you can make sure you are wearing bright colours that will stand out against the background, use lights as appropriate etc.

Misjudging what you are going to do could take a number of forms - maybe a driver expected you to be going much slower than you really are, or thought you'd take a different line or some such. Misjudging your speed may endanger you if someone pulls out in front of you expecting the space to be bigger than it is, so be aware of what's going on ahead. Riding predictably makes it easier for other road users to figure out what you're likely to do next so there are fewer nasty surprises all around.

If you do get the kind of maniac who can see you but still hits you there's not a lot you can do about it. Thankfully such people appear to be incredibly rare, and encountering one is pretty much like encountering the guy with the big knife in the park.