By popular demand, the route is a little longer this week. We will be striving to maintain the 28 kph pace. If it looks like we are stuck for time, I may shorten the ride by turning onto 20 Sideroad instead of 15 which will shorten the ride by 8 km.
For those interested, I will be going for a pint/food at Woolie after the ride.
Angela has a very valid point. There isn’t much the club offers to new riders other than the generosity that Jim offers on the Wed. night learn to ride.
I personally think it’s a big ask for newer riders to join in with the “regular” Wed. night riders.
In the best interest of the newer riders, I think this should be a completely separate ride. That way depending on the newer riders needs that week a ride could be created.
Or, if the numbers keep increasing on Wed. nights, forming two groups. Group A, AVG speed of 28kph, as posted and group B to be determined by the least strongest riders needs.
Sad fully, these are the growing pains of a cycling club. Hopefully all will have the patience and understanding and try to work together so that all have a good ride.
Cory,
The B group formed after the whole group rode together to the left turn off of Arkell towards Indian Trail. Angela rode with the then-formed B group and was much happier with that (so was I and, I believe, everyone else in the B group). (Angela, please correct me if I’m wrong!). So the B group did about 36 km after dropping off the A group, and we averaged 26.8 kph for that segment.
Meg
Hi Angela,
Sorry to hear you had a disappointing ride, did you do choose to do the A group ride or the B group?
Luc/Jim do you guys know what the average speed was for the two groups?
Cory
I agree with both Angela and Lisa. After a couple years away from the Club, I`m finding Wed nights to be a bit like Thurs nights were when I was Ride Coordinator in 2008/2009. We were trying to make those nights welcoming (there was no Wed ride), but we lost several members as those rides just got faster and faster. And a 20-person pace line is too big, especially, eg, given that several riders excessively increase their effort up hills, and outside 2nd place riders often move to the front far too quickly – these things lead to a group that breaks up with dropped riders struggling to catch up, or is forcing riders to surge and brake a lot. Corners and crossings become problematic as well.
I would suggest, to start with, breaking up into smaller groups. And a lot more focus on teamwork. There are enough experienced ride leaders showing up each week, at least now, that this could be done. Our Group B on this ride was delightful. The pace line worked very smoothly, and everyone was comfortable. (And we averaged ~27 on our section).
Disappointed in the Wednesday night ride. Supposed to be recreational but too large a group and too fast. There are multiple options for fast rides and only one for recreational – which turned out not to be so recreational/social. Makes it hard for new members to join the club.
Good ride in Group B last night! 7 riders made for a good intro to the social pace line system and the speed was just right.
Good ride. We ended up with 27 people so luckily Jim was around to take a second group of 7 or so.
Wow Luc, beer not coffee?? May join you and others.