B ride for Fridays

[Greg Miller]

Can I suggest we have two groups for the Friday ride?

20+ people seems too much when going through Mt. Doug in the dark, and I think two groups would keep everyone at a better suited pace.

Greg

[Roland]

I agree it should be split if 20+ people show up. Problem is, nobody seems to like B rides anymore. I suggest an A and an A+ ride.

The other option is to send half the people on the Tuesday ride and the other half on the Friday ride. And then do the opposite on Tuesday.

[leftcoaster]

Another option may be just to do a good old-fashioned countoff. When we're all there, count 1 - 2 around the circle and have one group leave 3-4 minutes before the other. Or alternately, the first 10 to arrive, leave as a group right at 6:00 and the rest can leave at 6:05. It's arbitrary but being one of the riders in the pileup last week wasn't a lot of fun. (Rolf however provided me with a soft landing).

David B.

[Lister Farrar]

What pile-up?

[leftcoaster]

Maybe 'pileup' was a little strong - only three of us went down. Everyone rode away with only a small bruise or two.

- David B

[Lister Farrar]

Problem is, nobody seems to like B rides anymore.

I like B rides.

We're also getting dangerously close to picking teams for dodgeball, and I for one don't want to get picked last....again!

[Josh.E]

I, for one, would rather not see the ride split up. The best thing about the tripleshot tuesday/ friday/sunday rides is that they are all inclusive.
I do think a bit of effort on pack riding etiquette by everyone would go a long way. We have a tendency to sometimes turn into quite a chaotic blob as we travel down the road, and I've noticed quite a few more pissed off drivers lately than there used to be.

At the same time, I hear what Roland and Greg are saying. There may be a practical upper limit to how big the group can safely grow to as we ride single file through mt doug in the dark, and the reality is that we have a very wide range of cycling abilities showing up to these rides.

I found these rules of group riding etiquette online. It's worth the read, especially for those newer to pack riding. Number 9 is worth noting in a club like ours with so much varying ability and fitness levels. Letting stronger riders take longer pulls, and taking shorter pulls yourself keeps everybody working at closer to their own ability level, while also keeping the entire group together:

1. Be Predictable—This may be the most important rule (even for solo riding) and it involves every aspect of riding from changing positions in the group to following the traffic rules. You might say that all the other rules support this one. Smooth predictable riding isn’t just a matter of style...here the word survival comes to mind! If unpredictability is the only predictable part of your riding style, you are a hazard to yourself and everyone else who has the misfortune to ride with you. Have you ever been on a ride where the group stops at an intersection and people scatter all over the lane? Some going through on the wrong side of the road and others turning left from the right side? Some running the stop sign and others doing it right? It’s confusing and irritating to drivers of vehicles as they approach a situation where cyclists are going in all different directions or just blowing through stops! Part of being predictable is riding within the rules of the road as a vehicle. Groups should maintain integrity when approaching intersections. That means staying in the correct lane, stopping together, and starting together as traffic allows. It goes without saying that if we demand the right to ride on the road, then we must be willing to ride responsibly...especially as a group.
2. Don’t Overlap Wheels—This habit will get you in real trouble. This is a good way to test your ability to do cartwheels if you don't adhere to this rule. Some people do it from lack of concentration, others may just not know any better, but sooner or later they'll crash. There is no recovery from a front wheel deflection. All it takes is for the person in front to move sideways a few inches...if someone is overlapping his wheel, that someone will go down along with practically everyone who is behind him. Many times the person in front can recover, but not the people behind.
3. Be Steady—This includes speed and line. If the person behind you fails to adhere to #2, you will contribute to a crash if you wallow around all over the road. When everyone is working for the group, maintain a steady speed as you go to the front. Ever notice how easy it is to ride behind some folks? If you take note of their riding style you’ll probably notice they don’t yo-yo around in the pack. They are rock steady. When they take the lead, they don't accelerate. If they are strong enough to accelerate the group, they do it after the previous pull has rejoined the rear of the group and then only gradually so as to not string out the pack. When they are leading, they ride a straight line and their speed will be constant with the conditions. What a joy to ride with someone like this. Sometimes steady doesn’t just mean speed. It means steady pressure on the pedals…uphill or downhill, headwind or tailwind. When you are following someone like this, life is good! When they are following, they don’t make sudden moves or they know how to control their spacing by using their body position instead of using the brakes. Sudden braking will set off general alarms from everyone in the rear and make you very unpopular. If you do use the brakes, feather the front brake only and keep pedaling against the resistance. This allows you to moderate your speed without disturbing trailing riders
4. Announce Hazards—When you are in the lead, you are responsible for the safety of everyone behind you. You will become very unpopular very quickly if people behind you keep bouncing off of potholes, running over rocks, or reacting to unsafe traffic situations that you fail to point out. You need to be very vocal when approaching intersections, slowing, stopping, or turning and all actions should be smooth and deliberate. Sudden, unannounced actions will throw terror into any peloton. Riders in the pack should relay these warnings to the rear. When you are following, announce oncoming traffic from the rear…in this case others should relay this info toward the front.
5. Signal—Signaling lets everyone (vehicles and riders) know your intentions…remember #1? This makes you predictable. Also, it’s a good idea to make eye contact with oncoming traffic at intersections. One note here, use your right arm straight out to signal a right turn. It’s uncool to stick out your left bent arm to signal a right turn; more importantly, it’s impracticable and ineffective. In a big group combine this with a loud vocal warning of your intentions.
6. Don’t Fixate—If you are staring at something (i.e., the wheel in front of you), eventually you’ll hit it! When you walk in a crowd, you don’t stare at the back of the person in front of you…so you shouldn’t ride like that either. Learn to be comfortable looking around or through the riders ahead of you. This will allow you to see things that are developing in front of the group. With a little practice you will be able to "sense" how far you are off the wheel in front of you.
7. Stay Off Aero Bars—This shouldn’t require much discussion. They are much too unstable to be used in a group ride. Plus, you don't need to be on aero bars if you are in a pack as you will receive more aerodynamic effect from the other riders anyway. Maybe...one exception…when you are at the front pulling you can get away with it, but never, never, never when you are within the group or following a wheel. I know there are some people, usually triathletes, who are more comfortable on the bars. But, sooner or later, steering with your elbows in a group will add new meaning to the term "lunch on the road." Plus, it really tics off those behind you when you go down in a pack! Use aero bars for what they are meant for...solo fast riding.
8. Don’t Leave Stragglers— If you get separated at intersections, as a matter of courtesy, the lead group should soft pedal until the rest have rejoined. Another note here is that if you are the one who will be caught by the light, don't run the red light to maintain contact. If they don't wait for you to catch up, you may not want to be riding with them anyway. Also as a courtesy to those who may not be able to stay with the group, the pack should wait at certain points along the route to regroup. Especially, at turn points and if the stragglers don’t know the route. Now obviously this is not applicable during a race but we're not talking about a race...No one should be left alone on a group ride. If you don't adhere to this rule, your "group" will get smaller each week until you're riding solo.
9. Know Your Limitations—If you’re not strong enough or too tired to take a turn at the front, stay near the back and let the stronger cyclists pull in front of you instead of making them go to the back of the line. Unless they are a complete...well you know...they will appreciate that more than having to get past you to get back to the front. Plus, it strokes the animal's ego as you admit that he/she is the stronger rider. Another point here, don’t pull at the front faster and longer than you have energy to get back in at the rear (Remember, your "pull" isn't over until you do). I've seen this scenario many times, it comes "biker wannabe's" time to take his/her pull and the pace is getting up there. The thoughts running through his/her mind is, "I need to show these guys that I can pull 2 mph faster than everyone else has been pulling." They go to the front and hammer. Legs begin to burn after a monumental pull...now it's time to pull over and let some "lesser" rider take a turn. Well, the "lesser" biker is all refreshed after tagging on a wheel and is ready to punch it up another notch. It's bye-bye to the first rider as he/she gets blown off the back...toast! Testosterone and ego is a volatile mix (even for you females) and it can get you dropped in a heartbeat.
10. Change Positions Correctly—A common beginner faux pas is to stop pedaling just before pulling off the front. This creates an accordion effect toward the rear. Keep a steady pressure on the pedals until you have cleared the front. After pulling off, soft pedal and let the group pull through. As the last couple riders are passing through, begin to apply more pressure to smoothly take your position at the rear. If you don’t time it correctly, you’ll create a gap and have to sprint to get back on. A technique used to reenter the line is to move your bike sideways first then your body. Try it. It will feel awkward at first, but it is the safest way to move within a group. It's just a small subtle move not an exaggerated one. If you lean your body first and misjudge the speed or the person in front of you slows down, you’ll touch wheels and be leaning the wrong way…bad situation! If you move the bike first, you will have a chance to pull it back.
11. Climbing—Ever been behind someone when they stood up going up hill and all of a sudden you were all over them? If you need to stand, shift up a gear to compensate for the slower cadence and stand up smoothly keeping a steady pressure on the pedals. This will keep you from moving backward relative to the rider behind you. Apply the opposite technique when changing to a sitting position. Downshift and keep a steady pressure on the pedals to avoid abrupt changes in speed. It takes a little practice, but your riding buddies will be glad you spent the time learning how to do it right.
12. Descending—The leader must overcome a much greater wind resistance as the speed increases. If you are leading, keep pedaling. If you don’t, everyone behind you will eat your lunch. Riders to the rear will accelerate faster downhill as drafting becomes more effective at the higher speeds. If you are following, back off a couple of bike lengths to compensate for the greater affects of drafting. If you are closing on the rider in front, sit up and let the wind slow you or use light braking to maintain spacing, but in both cases you should keep pedaling against the resistance. Keeping your legs moving not only makes it easier to keep the spacing, but also helps the legs get rid of the acid build up from the previous climb.
13. Relax—This one is really important. It will allow you to be smooth and responsive. You can bet that if you see someone who is riding a straight line and is very steady, he/she is relaxed on the bike. It not only saves energy, but it makes bike handling much more effective. Anytime you are riding in close proximity of other riders there's always the chance that you may come into contact. If you have tense arms and get bumped from the side, the shock will go directly to the front wheel and you will swerve, possibly lose control, and possibly cause a massive pile up. If you are relaxed, it's much easier to absorb the bump without losing control. A good exercise is to go to a grassy field (which is softer than pavement if you fall) with a friend and ride slowly side by side. Relax your arms and lightly bump each other using your relaxed elbows to absorb the (light) impact. You will become familiar with how to safely recover from that type of contact. It may save you some road rash someday.

[Rolf]

Great tips and reminders, Josh. These can't get posted too many times from my perspective. I always think "Oh right, forgot about that the other morning!" every time I read them.

It could just be my winter torpor and a sense everyone's getting faster but me, but I feel sometimes these days like our rides have swung away from the "recreational fitness" and more toward the "training" side of the motivation continuum. I suppose that's natural with race season around the corner and racing really floating some folks' boats.

It's interesting to look at the Society Act bylaws posted on our website:

2. The purposes of the club are:
(a) To manage, develop and conduct programs in the sport of cycling in Greater Victoria, British Columbia.
(b) To work co-operatively with community groups, individuals, agencies and organizations (public, private and professional) to enhance the recreational experience of persons who participate in cycling.
(d) To promote, develop and foster good citizenship through challenging recreation.

I wonder if the mysteriously missing (c) was "To make members cycle faster."?

I think the group-ride inclusiveness is part of what makes Tripleshot great, but splitting our rides could better cater to our possibly different motivations for getting up in the morning, and may make things safer.

So instead of the inherently ordinal "A" and "B" or even "A+" and "A" (you might as well call them "Strong" and "Weak"), why don't we call our rides "Training" and "Recreational"? Some days I don't really want or need to feel like I'm getting faster -- I just want to get a decent workout in a beautiful environment surrounded by good people doing the same thing. Anybody else feel this way? (I'm guessing if you own a heartrate monitor, you think I'm speaking Greek.)

Winter continues and I have another virus brewing. So if I'm up tomorrow it will be to gratefully ride B... or A-... or Recreational ... or whatever you want to call it!

[Roland]

Tripleshot has 43 registered members plus many guests that just join us for rides. Skill levels range from just started riding to Cat1. I don't think it's reasonable to expect everybody to get maximum enjoyment out of just one style of ride.

I think we have enough members now that we could support rides 7 days a week or several rides per day. Race training, recreational, hills, A, B, etc. We could do it all.

However, I don't think we should be exclusive or force a split. But if people would have more fun on a B ride, then we should make sure it happens.

(And for those that never went on the B ride, it wasn't slow. It averaged 29km/h, where the A ride is about 31km/h right now. It just took the hills a little slower.)

So, if anybody has ideas for what type of ride we are lacking, post a thread and people will come. Josh did for his Saturday race training ride and that has turned out quite well.

[JohnT]

Rolf is getting to the heart of the matter I think. Some of us are riding with the racing season in mind. Also, I expect that some of us are thinking that the 'steady up' thing is a short term response to new members. The problem is that fast people get faster too, so the expectations keep changing. Furthermore, some don't want to get faster, just fitter.

All of the suggestions in Josh's post are valuable and, as Rolf points out, worth re-reading. But we will also benefit from some group-specific solutions. The Tuesday Square and Wednesday Hills seem to work. What about two slightly different Friday routes? We leave together but half of the group goes straight to Mt Doug, missing Blenkinsop. Those riders then add the equivilent distance elsewhere in the ride. I'll bet there's a loop in the vicinity of Ash. Then we all meet up well before Queen Alexandria. Now we have half the people running through the park in the dark at the same time. This also means that some people have the opportunity to short cut Blenkinsop but skip the extra loop if thery aren't feeling up to the full distance.

Just an idea.

Sundays aren't perfect either: At least three people have been abandoned recently, and we need to make sure that doesn't keep happening.

JT (PS - I submitted a couple of messages that seem to have disappeared. I apologize if they all show up at once)

[jeremy]

What about two slightly different Friday routes? We leave together but half of the group goes straight to Mt Doug, missing Blenkinsop. Those riders then add the equivilent distance elsewhere in the ride. I'll bet there's a loop in the vicinity of Ash. Then we all meet up well before Queen Alexandria. Now we have half the people running through the park in the dark at the same time. This also means that some people have the opportunity to short cut Blenkinsop but skip the extra loop if thery aren't feeling up to the full distance.

Just an idea.)

I did what John is suggesting last friday, I skipped Blenkinsop and just headed straight up shelbourne, at the top of Ash I did 4 box loops of Torquay-Barrie-Tyndall-Ash until you guys showed up, As one of the groups weaker riders I found this worked great for me. The pace down the rest of the waterfront seems to be a managable one for me until we hit King George where might I suggest if were doing one bigger group ride that the "B" riders make sure to hook up at the top of the hill so maybe we can pace-line it in, working together to try to catch some of those "A" riders.

[FairweatherMike]

Great discussion and superb group riding tips. Communication and consensus is what makes Tripleshot such a great group. I'm looking forward to early rides with the busy Bs once the earth's tilt reduces the darkness (unreasonable risk) factor... (and the knees declare that they're ready to rotate again)

Mike S.

[wonger]

I agree with Josh. I think the best thing that could come from this is a renewed awareness of group etiquitte and dynamics. For me, the group is the main attraction having been on many b rides that consist of four or six people.

[Josh.E]

The pack riding seemed much better this morning. Everybody waited at the top of Ash, we stayed in a tight two up along arbutus, and the entire group stopped and waited for oncoming traffic turning left into uplands at the top of caddy bay.

We could still stand to remember to tighten up to the right to let cars by sometimes when we hear "car back", but overall things seemed much better than the last couple fridays.

The highlight of the ride for me was "kick him when he's down!!" and "hammer!!, hammer!!" when I dropped my chain going up king george.

What were other's impressions?

[Roland]

Marcie got dropped somewhere along the way, which isn't the best way to introduce new riders to our group.

I always thought "car back" meant form a blob and don't let the car past. I guess I've been doing it wrong all this time.

[Josh.E]

No, not a great way to introduce someone to our ride.

Maybe we could take turns being a designated sweeper for the ride to stay at the back? Someone strong enough to help pull people back on. If everyone knew from the beginning of the ride who that was, when we wait at the top of ash, etc. We would be able to wait until the sweeper got there, and we would be able to ensure no-one is still off the back.

[Rolf]

Our usual sweeper is sitting on a lanai, posting gloatstats of his rides in the Hawaii heat.

Pete usually does a great job of monitoring and assisting stragglers; though sometimes it feels more like a border collie rounding up wayward lambs.

[JohnT]

Josh,

We figured you'd crossed that invisible go-for-it line at the base of King George. I can vouch for Gavin. He did indicate that attacking when we knew you'd dropped a chain wasn't the kindest thing to do. Naturally that didn't stop him (or Dylan). I did my best (of coxpressed a little concern at the top urse) to slow them down (by drafting them down the hill), but it didn't work - never does . With friends like us, who needs enemies!

P.S. Why were you changing gears in the first place?

JT

[JohnT]

minor edit:

Josh,

We figured you'd crossed that invisible go-for-it line at the base of King George. I can vouch for Gavin. He did indicate that attacking when we knew you'd dropped a chain wasn't the kindest thing to do. Naturally that didn't stop him (or Dylan). I did my best (of course) to slow them down (by drafting them down the hill), but it didn't work - never does .

JT

[Josh.E]

I appreciate your heartfelt concern John . I'm sure you were torn up inside as you drafted those guys, as was Gavin as he took a pull.
I don't honestly care in the least about being left behind at king george.
We were past the start line. Once the mechanical bunny is let loose, you can't ask the dogs to stop chasing it.

I was just trying to channel my inner lance, and maintain a 110 cadence up the hill. Stupid dura ace derailleurs.......