First Group Ride of the Season
And I lived.
As I mentioned in another thread, the group that I've ridden with the most is kind of unique is that they really are no drop and the "main" group keeps a moderate pace. And there's always lunch. Despite the lower average speed of this group, most of the riders are very accomplished athletes. So, last year I only joined them once. I've tried to clear my Wednesdays, but even if I have just one client late in the day, I sometimes have a time constraint. Today's ride started at a farm market near my house, so I rode there. The group has evolved, so now there's usually a group that goes a longer distance and faster. They don't always split off, though. But today, we had 2 different groups. One going 23 miles at a very leisurely pace (it was a lot of people's first ride of the season), and the other, going 34 miles at the regular pace, which usually averages around 13, as we ride in places with good hills most of the time. So I decided to go with this group... and so did all of the "fast" guys. Let's just say I did my suffering today and I'm ready for anything. When we were about 8 miles from my house, the fast guys split off, to do an extra 12 miles and more hills. The end of the ride went right by my street, so I peeled off there to get ready for work and eat. My average was a good deal higher than it is for this type of a hilly ride. I wasn't the last person, either.
Thankfully, this group stops a few times during a ride, so I could catch my breath and eat. There were a few new faces, a couple of younger women, but they were not too friendly. I rode my Guru, so the guys were all interested in asking me about the bike.
Now I remember, though, why I started hating group rides... having to watch out for other's bad riding and dealing with cars in a group of 40 people.
