Hi nafula: The Silver Comet trail starts in Smyrna and offers a round trip of 75 miles of flat trails. The first fifteen miles are pretty active and then it starts to get a bit quieter. During the weekends, particularly in the mornings, it is quite busy. There was a murder there last summer and the victim was a woman cyclist riding on a week day afternoon. Women tend to be a bit more cautious out there now; but many still ride on their own.

Southern Bicycle League has a listing of current group rides on it's site and does have some at average speeds less than 17 miles per hour. The website is www.bikesbl.org

North Atlanta Riding Club offers a variety of group rides. It costs about $60.00 per year to join, typically includes a jersey and several rides that are free due to your membership fee going towards it. Below is information about a ride they had last weekend. There are also some rides on the southern side of Atlanta that offer rolling easy inclines and little traffic. One is called 'Silk Sheets' and the name definitely fits.

This past weekend's NARC ride informatoin

Judy is organizing a Ladies intro road ride for this Saturday out of Rockmart. Our initial discussion indicated she'd be doing a 47mile route on the scenic Taylorsville Loop. Of course this will be a no-drop ride and good opportunity for the new riders to experience the wiles of west Georgia and our more seasoned experienced lady riders to come out and share there experiences. Lunch post ride at Frankie's.

More details later.

Please post any questions you may have or send me a PM. Don't worry if you think 47miles is too much, I'll likely add some shortcuts to the route, just in case. Judy asked me to ride sweep, so I'll be hanging at the back to help with stragglers or mechanicals.

For those that might not be familiar with NARC, the North Atlanta Riding Club, it is the largest active cycling club in Georgia with ~600 riders and a great ride program to support it's members.'