The Hive Mentality: How to Ride (and Survive) in a Group

The Hive Mentality: How to Ride (and Survive) in a Group

GROUP RIDING BASICALLY ENCOMPASSES ANYTIME YOU’RE NOT riding solo, and it comes with its own set of challenges: Now you’re not only riding for yourself, but also for the good of the entire group. However, not all groups are the same. A 3-day bicycle tour with your best friends is going to roll differently from a ride with a seasoned racing team, and an organized fun-ride with 200 strangers is going to ride another way altogether. Still, there are many techniques that will apply to any group riding situation.

Clear communication and expectations are essential to group harmony. Don’t assume everyone is on the same page. If you show up for a ride with your buddies with tired legs and only want to ride flat for 30 miles, it’s important to know that the woman who called the ride together is looking to lead an all-day epic. Full disclosure from the ride organizers (even if that’s just you and a friend) goes a long way. Sometimes that may mean you pedal a little slower or faster than you’re comfortable with for the greater good of keeping the group together and the ride moving forward. If you’re not on board with the plan for the day, you may want to go for a spin on your own.

Although you’re keeping in mind the welfare of the group, don’t slack off into being a lemming that just follows along without thinking. It’s important to take care of yourself and think as an individual, as well as speak up for what you need—like a break or to slow down a bit. If the group or leader is attempting something scary or potentially hazardous, you don’t have to follow. At the end of the day, no matter who’s in front of you, you’re ultimately responsible for your own well-being.

Riding in a group or pack can also help you learn valuable individual riding skills that you may not be able to otherwise master. There’s a big difference between reading about how to climb and seeing someone dance on the pedals up a hill. This is the ultimate “monkey see, monkey do.” Watching others execute proper technique helps our brains and muscles understand what good form looks like.

Unofficial Group Rides with Friends, Clubs, or Teams 

Unofficial group rides come in many flavors, from weekly club rides to team training rides to Saturday spins with a few close friends. They are usually designated into one of two groups: drop or no-drop. Being “dropped” is the somewhat unpleasant term for getting left behind to fend for yourself and find your way home. A “no-drop ride” implies that the group will wait for you if you get a flat or fall off the back of the group.

Sometimes a team or club will differentiate what kind of ride it is when advertising them, but if not, it’s a really good idea to ask. If you’re uncomfortable with finding the route or catching up from a mechanical problem, don’t head out on a no-drop ride unless you can find a buddy that’s willing to stick with you.

Newer riders tend to either ride alone or stick to no-drop rides. Rides where everyone stays together tend to be more recreational and less aggressive than rides where you can be left to fend for yourself. That being said, joining a regular ride that hammers along without stopping can be a great challenge and can help you build speed and stamina. Because these rides that don’t wait for stragglers tend to be a bit more competitive, they will push you harder and faster and be a great motivator for getting in better shape if you’re cycling for fitness or with aspirations of racing.

Organized Group Rides 

In these events you’ll pay an entry fee to pedal along with somewhere between 50 and 5,000 like-minded riders along a marked, predesignated route with support vehicles and rest stops provided by the organizers. Usually these one- to multi-day events are fundraisers or designed around a particular theme or location, and you have the added benefit of not having to worry about food or route-finding—the organizers take care of the details for you. Although everyone wants to have a great time, since you’ve likely never met most of the riders around you, everyone will have their own version of what that means. Some cyclists are out to challenge their past year’s performance for a personal best time. Others might just be trying to get to the finish of their first long ride or have a fun day with friends or family. These different agendas can butt up against each other, but there are a few simple ways to keep the peace.

Hopefully the organizers have given you a map, cue sheets, and marked turns along the route. Now it’s up to you to ride courteously and generously with all your new cycling compatriots. Use all your signals and communications. When passing, give plenty of loud warning before you pass, then plenty of room as you do ride by. A startled cyclist is an unpredictable cyclist—and prone to swerving. Yelling a warning when you’re already right up next to them may do more harm than good. Never, ever pass on the right, even if the cyclist is in the middle of the road. By giving them plenty of warning, they should have time to move over. If it takes them a second, keep your patience and slow down until it’s safe to pass—which shouldn’t be a big deal if you’re already that much faster than them. Anytime you make a pass, it’s nice to give a thanks, a wave, or a quick “Have a great ride!” before carrying on.

If you’re the one being passed, move over as soon as it’s safe. Don’t hold a grudge or take it personally that someone is faster than you and make it more difficult to pass than need be. If you’re already over toward the right side of the road, continue to hold your line and don’t make any sudden moves to the right or left that could throw off other riders around you.

Touring

If you think you want to bike tour with someone, make sure that you not only have ridden with them before but that you are also on the same page as far as expectations for speed, stops, and mileage. Take the story of Ellee Thalheimer, author of the cycle touring guide Cycling Sojourner and the Lonely Planet Guide to Italy, and her then fiancé (now husband), Joe Partridge. Joe was a long-distance endurance racer without much touring experience, and Ellee loved nothing more than eating, drinking, and breathing adventure on two wheels—but at a steady pace with plenty of stops. Two strong, experienced cyclists hitting the road together—a perfect match. Before they set out on their first tour, it was decided that they’d ride close together for the most part, except on climbs (where Joe was much stronger), when they would regroup on the top.

It quickly became clear by the end of the first day that while Ellee was content to stop, take photos, eat a leisurely lunch, and take her time pedaling through their predetermined mileage, Joe was in race mode and getting frustrated with what he felt was puttering along. Joe’s lunch was a quickly woofed-down energy bar. Ellee pulled out an avocado, some bread, hummus, nuts, and veggies. Joe, not only exasperated, was also a little jealous.

After a big discussion at the campground that first night, it was decided that someday Ellee would enter an endurance race, but in the meantime, Joe was going to learn to take the world in a little more slowly. Their story has a happy ending. Joe learned that there can be a lot more to touring than bagging miles (including lots of off-the-beaten-path adventuring), and Ellee later found that she was a fantastic endurance racer when she was one of the few finishers of a 200-mile race on gravel roads in 110-degree heat.

The moral here is that if you’re planning on touring with other people and want to stick together, you’ll want to have very compatible riding paces and goals, or the faster person will have to slow down to the pace of the slowest person in the group. You can also decide to follow the same route and not actually ride together, but meet up at the end of the day—which some people find to be the way to go so that each rider can enjoy the day at his or her own pace.

Pack Riding and Pacelines 

The main difference between riding as a group and working as a pack is the use of drafting, where you get very close to the rider ahead of you—optimally less than a foot behind them—and the aerodynamics of their body breaking the wind pulls you along. You can do this with just two cyclists, with 20, or with an entire race like in the Tour de France. It’s a great tactic to make it through windy days or very long rides and very, very useful to new cyclists who may not be as strong as their fellow pack riders.

The most organized pack riding happens in pacelines, where riders conform to one or two (called a double) long lines. Cycling in a properly functioning paceline can be a huge thrill. It’s the epitome of working together for a larger cause. The workload is shared as each rider takes his turn at the front—called a pull. This allows a peloton to sometimes ride 5 or more miles per hour faster than an individual could solo. It’s pretty cool to be swept along—and keep up—with a group of riders and can make the miles spin by so much more smoothly.

Unfortunately, sometimes the paceline can be more effort than it’s worth if the riders aren’t playing nice with the rest of the group or, worse yet, don’t know the rules well enough to participate. In these cases, the ride quickly deteriorates into both a figurative and literal drag. Following these basic rules and etiquette will get you far and have your group performing like a finely tuned machine.