Club issues

[SadieKate]

I have to agree with Irulan. Lead a slower ride some days and go hammer with the A group other days knowing you may be dropped. Good training means you mix up the pace anyway. I've gone out with my two co-workers a couple of times, took my town bike, rode slow and talked about bike handling, etc. It has really been rewarding for me. I get slow recovery days but more importantly its making me think about what I went through in the early days. I'm finding new inspiration from their joy of discovery. I also do little things on the bike path with them that I don't take time to do when I'm on harder rides - practice riding without hands (can do on my mtbike but just getting up the guts to do it on the road), countersteering even the smallest of corners, turning waaay around to look behind me, slow races, etc. Little things that get passed up when you're always out hammering.

I have to think that if the word goes out that you are leading these B rides that your credibility within your local bike community will go up and you may attract riders in that mid-range speed that you're looking for. Maybe even end up with decent size A, B and C groups.

[bikerHen]

Hey Irulan, Can I come ride with your beginning groups? I can't seem to find any slow-mo road groups to ride with. BikerHen

[Irulan]

Hey Irulan, Can I come ride with your beginning groups? I can't seem to find any slow-mo road groups to ride with. BikerHen

Sure we go out on Monday nights, usually at Riverside but not always. Tonight, I think we are meeting bowl and pitcher at 6 pm. You can get my phone # via my sig, the gal who runs them likes a head count.

For road, check into the WOW women's group, and Spokane Bicycle Club.

[bikerHen]

Darn! Can't go on Monday nights. I have play practice up on GreenBluff. I have been riding my bike up there once a week. It's good uphill practice.

I tried WOW, and was not quite up to their standard. Have thought about Spokane Bike Club and Mountaineers, but I waited to long to join in and all the road rides have gotten to fast for me.

I really do enjoy riding by myself, but would like to be a part of the local cycling groups too. What is a poor hen to do?! BikerHen

[betagirl]

So my griping to the club has caused some good discussions. We're going to have a meeting and review the "rules" of the weekday rides and see what we need to do to keep new rider interest while keeping the veterans happy. I offered to lead the B group on one of the weeknights, and some others have stepped up as well. So I'm going to be a club floozy and ride with both. The one will give me better racing training and more time riding with other women, and I can maintain the friendships I've made with the guys.

Thanks for the advice and letting me vent.

[joyrider]

These kind of discussions make me NEVER want to join a club!
Doesn't anybody ride for fun anymore?

[Pax]

Doesn't anybody ride for fun anymore?

Since many of the clubs have predominantly male membership I would guess "guy fun" is the order of the day. My impression of what they think of as "fun" can be very different than what many women think is fun.

[Dogmama]

These kind of discussions make me NEVER want to join a club!
Doesn't anybody ride for fun anymore?

Ditto. Now I remember why I ride alone so often.

OTOH, I chose my rides. Sometimes, I want to ride with the 2% body fat crowd because that is how I'll get stronger. I know I'll be dropped - oh well! If I know it's a competitive group, it's my choice. It sounds like you have more than one group out there - so I'd think that each rider could choose their own poison.

[yellow]

These kind of discussions make me NEVER want to join a club!
Doesn't anybody ride for fun anymore?

I belong to the funnest club around...Amici Veloci! My impression is that it's about riding and bonding with each other (and our bikes) and eating and adventures.

The local "club" that I ride with also is way fun. The rides are never that intense and the focus is on just getting out and riding. Sometimes I ride hard and sometimes I sweep. We usually spread way out but most of us will all have dinner together afterwards and talk about everything from the tour to the traffic.

So some clubs are still fun. I think it depends upon what you expect from the club.

[jobob]

These kind of discussions make me NEVER want to join a club!
Doesn't anybody ride for fun anymore?

(pops head up) Mee ! I do!

Hi, I'm jobob, and I'm a slacker. I don't "treat every ride as a training ride" (I cringe whenever I hear that, LOL !) and I consider hammering something you do to nails.

My husband and I used to belong to a club located in our hometown, but the prevailing attitude was along the lines of what betagirl and others wrote about. Bleah, I don't need that ! The club we now belong to is located a ways from our home, so we often (but not always) need to drive over a half hour to get to the start of a ride. But the club offers a wide variety of rides, and we soon learned which types of rides, and which ride leaders, best suit our abilities and temperments. I think the fact that there is such a large number & variety of rides allows the hardbodies to have their definition of fun, while the more social riders have theirs. It's a good mix. (If you're in the San Jose CA area, it's the Almaden Cycle Touring Club - www.actc.org - jobob sez check it out)

Sure, I'd probably be a better, stronger, faster rider if I pushed myself more. But knowing me I'd more likely burn out and quit if it stopped being fun - I have a really low tollerance for pain ! That's not to say I don't push myself when the spirit is willing, I like to get stronger and faster to be able to go on more interesting rides, but not at the expense of losing the fun.

[Geonz]

So my griping to the club has caused some good discussions. We're going to have a meeting and review the "rules" of the weekday rides and see what we need to do to keep new rider interest while keeping the veterans happy. I offered to lead the B group on one of the weeknights, and some others have stepped up as well. So I'm going to be a club floozy and ride with both. The one will give me better racing training and more time riding with other women, and I can maintain the friendships I've made with the guys.

Thanks for the advice and letting me vent.

It's agood plan... but boy, it takes patience and persistence to change their ways even once a week.

You can suggest that people bring their funkiest oldest bike -- it's what I do. It changes both the physiology and the psychology, and I've not known people to be insulted by it; they're more comforted by it.

[runnergirl]

I'm not sure why the cycling community is so difficult sometimes...

We have a great club here, they have a huge variety of rides that stay under 14, plus lots of rides in the 15-18 range. There are however, no rides that go faster. I finally tracked down a unaffiliated group that rides on Saturdays, but if the LBS owner didn't introduce me around I would have been completely ignored. It's a hammer till I puke, elbow bumping, no one even looks over their shoulder when I drop kinda ride, but it's the best training for racing there is.

When a few of the guys from the faster group show up to a regular club ride, everyone else grumbles about them showing up. I think it's great, because then there are A, B, and C pace groups, instead of just C/B.

No club is perfect...in fact most have problems. It's sad that cycling is so hard to get into, it seems it's all about who you know in a lot of ways.