indyfabz

Not on my Safari either.

MinnMan

better HTFU

Ghazmh

Oh well, only 2 pages so far.

Bah Humbug

Mobile site is such a hot mess I always use desktop, even on my phone. I try to forget it even exists.

guadzilla

If you can see what impact you had when passing a hybrid rider too closely, you arent going fast enough. HTFU cupcake.

10 Wheels

I once was PASSED by a Rider that Shouted. There is 18 More Coming. He was ahead of The Pace Line.

burnthesheep

The #1 issue I have with the weekend group rides I see around town is a lack of discipline WRT holding a paceline or rotation. These 50+ person groups overlap wheels, ride 3 and 4 wide when pulling off the front, get scared to ride close enough to the wheel in front of them or person beside them, etc...... It looks like a freaking Fred-fest. If someone finds that offensive, then take action and ask a leader to lead by demonstrating or controlling the group into a safer formation. Or find a group with a leader who will show you how it is done.

When you get THAT crossing paths with a solo rider, yeah, it's the group's problem.

When a tight paceline passes a solo rider you can probably pass them barely getting close to the center yellow. With plenty of space.

I've had the issue/dilemma of these groups usually being a B-group and I need to pass freaking 50 to 100 people strung all over the dang place. I yell out, nobody hardly listens, and I wind up having to pass over the yellow like a car would pass.

My suggestions:
-if your group members can't rotate or can't roll both front folks off to the same side and slotting onto the back............split up the huge group into smaller chunks going off 10min apart
-teach folks to freaking rotate so you don't get 4-wide clusters of groups that meander all over the road, you said it's a hammer ride..........a rotation ought to form on the front and either form a break or set the pace. Then folks behind should be 2-up and either slotting in time to time or attacking outright. Not sitting 3 and 4 wide just for the hell of it.

There's a group local to Raleigh called Team CBC. I have no idea why they post so many fail videos up on Facebook of terrible group ride skills. It's usually in a "hey we had a good time" good nature. But it almost always shows folks way out of line, meandering, not rotating, 4-wide, over the center yellow, doing basically 75% of everything wrong. The Gyros are the opposite, typically a textbook paceline or rotation with good spacing and positions and movements. Tony is a great leader for that group.

Folks don't need to be rubbing elbows like it's the last lunge for the finishing corner in a crit, but they don't need to ride 5 feet beside the next person either. Even then, that's what shoulders and elbows are for.......so you don't hook bars. A good distance for even just a modest seasonal B rider is if you were to while riding reach out with your arm you should be able to barely touch the person's elbow or shoulder beside you with your fingertips.

Yeah, if there isn't gross negligence on the rider's part you are passing..........then yeah it is the group's fault. The person in front has the right of way.

Reflector Guy

Ah, yes, the guy who warned us there are muggings on the very best bike path in the whole Chicago metropolitan area. Makes me wonder if him and Larry are the same person. Neither of whom have ridden on said path.

aclinjury

There are a couple of popular rides here on Saturday and Sunday morning that attract all the racer-wannabe spandexters from cat 5 all the way to cat 1. Anyone can just show up and ride. The fast cat 1/2 guys are the one doing the pulling at the front. Cruising speed is usuaslly fast as they try to keep it pinned at 28-29 mph with lots of hard acclerations out of corners. If you start at the back of the peloton, you will eventually be shelled out half way into the ride because of all the hard efforts you need to put in to catch up. Every small hills is an attack so you better have a good 1 minute power or say bye bye to the lead guys. Blowing stop signs and blowing yellow is to be expected. If you're the timid type who brake-check at these points, you'll be screamed at (and possibly be reamed from behind too). If you cannot rail the corners and have to sit up to brake check, you best not be up front because you'll be yelled at too (and of course sitting at the back means you'll get shelled sooner than you'd like). While we don't get 100+ riders, but pre-pandemic we get 50-70 riders easily. On the road I have not seen the group run close to slow cyclists because the rides start early enough where there streets are cleared.

But, when rolling home, some of these guys would take the river trails to wind down, but they are still going 20+ mph, and here I have seen them buzz walkers and runners ALL the time!!! This create a lot of friction not only with runners, but with other e-bikers as well. And some of these young ebikers are not push over either and I have seen on occassion an ebiker on one of those bigass heavy ebike (looks more like a motocross motos with their fat tires) with full face helmet, body armor, and he will not budge on his side of the trail, he will not move to the right (as the cyclist group have come to expect), and I've seen close calls of headon collision, only to be avoided at the last minute as the cyclists frantically move to their right. All I can say is that if racerboy cyclist collide with an ebiker moto guy, the cyclist would lose easily.

Branko D

Haven't seen the situation, but doing an U turn on the road without checking what's behind you and signaling your intentions is ​​​​​gross negligence, you're at fault if you cut someone off and cause a crash doing it.

The woman is lucky she didn't do a blind U turn in front of a car, could have been tragic.
​

caloso

Cat 5s to Cat 1s aren't wannabe racers. They're racers.

kcjc

Sorry, not feeling sorry for her if she was wearing earphones. I feel sorry for the rest that went down because of her and hope they get her to pay for the damages. If the ride is so dangerous, why ride it? There's a fair weather, weekly unsanctioned road race near were I live. I jumped on the ride twice and wouldn't do it again because when the ride opens up, they take the whole lane and sometimes the opposite. It's on a two lane road that is technically a highway so the differential between car and rider is at least 30 mph and it's not always a quiet road. I feel it's too reckless so I choose not to ride it anymore. You can do it too.

rsbob 

It’s good to know you were never young and dumb.

OP, I used to ride with similar groups but left after I determined their actions to be reckless and unsafe. The amount of testosterone fueled competition for every climb and sprint point, as well as running stops and red lights was too much. I then found a group that rode hard, but were law abiding and considerate toward inexperienced cyclists. They didn’t take unnecessary risks and seldom dropped people because of a mechanical or flat. If people did get dropped there were designated regroup stops or a rider or two would circle back to help then out.

You can ride hard, you can ride with experienced fast people, and you (and the public) can ride safely, if you ride with the right people. Hint: if they call them selves a peloton, they are not the ones you want to ride with.

Better yet, find a cycling or racing club with oversight by mature individuals that will help you develop your skills and speed.

MinnMan

I used to ride in one of those groups quite a lot. No discipline, never a good pace line (well, there were pace lines, but usually it was one strong person in front, sort of a single line behind them, but then becoming a double line or maybe something in between by 4th of 5th wheel. Lots of half wheeling, etc..) It was fun in some ways, but as I gained skills and awareness, I began to see the problems. I've found another group instead. Discipline is not perfect, but mostly it's a well-organized double pace line, with people taking turns up front and rotating safely. No half-wheeling, few gaps in the pace line. People ride shoulder to shoulder. Makes a hell of a difference.

LarrySellerz

4 wide is nothing for this ride, they are often 6+ wide. There are a bunch of riders and its a race, no leaders. I don't really care if we put ourselves in danger or piss off the cagers, I just want us to be respectful to our fellow riders on the road. If we have to cross the double yellow to give them 3 feet so be it. People have tried to coach this ride but its an exercise in futility

burnthesheep

Yeah, to address folks above.......I did mention "gross negligence" for a person in front of you. So ymmv depending on that.

An example of a person in front of you in greenway trail would be an off-leash dog person where the trail curves and doesn't have visibility. If you hit the dog, their fault. Gross negligence. If you were going 25mph on a greenway, you start to share some negligence as you were both breaking the rules.

This is why these groups need to be somewhat disciplined. Even USAC has the centerline rule and I've seen the moto go up and chat and threaten to pull riders.

My thing with the "weeknight worlds" stuff is that there is no medal on the line. No podium. I work for a living and need to get back to the family and work. So if you wanna do stupid ****, I'm likely to ask the vets in the group to sit up and let the "stupid" think they've won the ride by breaking away. Then once they're gone, continue on.

I think some of them just get way way too big or the routes are featureless enough that some Cat 6 folks can suck wheel forever. I know, just don't go if you don't like it. Sure. But I just feel it doesn't foster good community among other riders and cars if the blob is too unruly. Our weeknight worlds usually starts with 20 and about 4 to 6 start a hard rotation on front. Folks will fall off the back, jump in rotation, attack, etc... Nobody really goes over the yellow. We get tight if one of our Garmin Varias shows a car back and we wave them on.

Carbonfiberboy 

A ride leader I like has said, "We've got them right where we want them, out of sight." A good meme is "safe and cooperative riding" which of course can include rolling pacelines. A riding buddy was badly injured when a runner wearing ear buds on a MUP tried a U-turn in front of him. It's not a safe sport, but there's no good reason to try to make it even more unsafe. Just don't.

malcala622

I've had a group of 30+ riders swarm around my car while making a right hand turn. I still gave them plenty of space on my right so they can stick together on the turn.

I made a wide right turn to avoid hitting them but they still put themselves in harms way.

I of course cursed them out. I won't ride with a group like that if I see them behaving that way.

Sy Reene

A number of towns and municipalities are putting in ordinances and signs for cyclists single-file only and happily ticketing those found 2 abreast. Pulling over 50+ riders at once would be quite the catch.

burnthesheep

I'll see their ordinance for that the day they put some minivan moms in hard prison time for killing a cyclist or pedestrian.
While it is menacing to not take care riding in groups, the FYIGM or NIMBY is very very one sided when it comes to how the law prevents death and injury or deals with justice when someone does wind up hit, maimed, dead.

In the US, we simply do not care about "everyone does it" homicides. So the "they're in my way" wins out.

WhyFi

Beyond the challenges of pulling over a large group, it just doesn't make sense to enforce a singled-up approach when cyclists are in a lane - it strings out the group, making it a significantly longer pass for any overtaking vehicle. Unless it's a really wide lane, overtaking cyclists often means entering another lane; if the driver has to enter another lane, anyway, it makes the most sense to minimize that time by keeping the group of cyclists compact.

Sy Reene

Yeah. I think the idea is they want to discourage large mass groups. One of the local clubs won't do anything over 12 riders to a group, so would send out a group of 50 in 4 groups leaving about 5 minutes apart. A mass of riders doing 2-4 abreast makes it almost impossible for a car to pass if it's only a single lane until the group gets off that road.

Also fwiw, a number of the same municipalities also require paid permits if there's an obvious type of 'event' that has over XX number of riders that intend to pass through a town. This is found usually under the general heading that also covers parades, etc. Part of theory behind this is so they can pay to place cops at key intersections during the 'event'. So that's a second way in which towns have discouraged mass rides.

njkayaker

There's no right for people to ride in a large group.

If a group is too long to pass, maybe, the group is too large.

ClydeClydeson

I am glad the experienced cyclists have LarrySellerz around to tell them what they are doing wrong.

Reflector Guy

Or to fund some city official's vacation plans.