How to get faster? or maybe just ride alone?

[ACG]

How can I become strong enough to ride with a group that rides faster than me, if I can't keep up with them? Though I'm usually only about 5 minutes behind them.

And when I ride with the slower group I'm always in front.
So basically I'm in the middle. What do I do?

And what if the fast group is on a sort of if you can't keep up, you shouldn't come kick?

Sometimes I make excuses and ride alone.

Suggestions of all kinds welcome.

[elk]

I thought the title was "how to get fatter"...and I was getting ready to answer...

[OakLeaf]

Ha ha, story of my life.

Depending on the distance and difficulty, that 5 minute gap can be a LARGE difference in speed. So chances are you're not going to get faster just by tailing around after the fast group - if you tried to do speedwork from off the back, you'd probably wear yourself out before the ride was over.

Can you ask two or three of the slower members of the fast group, who might be closer to your level, to get together with you to do speedwork on days the club doesn't ride? That would be the easiest way for me to find motivation.

[PscyclePath]

Oakleaf has a great idea...

The key to getting faster is increasing your power, or strength, so that you can do more work (e.g., pedal harder or faster, maybe even in a bigger gear) while keeping your endurance the same, that is, without getting more tired than you would be otherwise.

Intervals are the classic, old school answer to building power. In the meantime, you can use one of the tricks that racers use to catch up to the pack when they get dropped, or to stay away once they get off the front. Find a couple of buddies with similar ideas, and practice your paceline skills. You can go faster as a small group with less energy by working as a rotation (a mini-paceline), and thus bridge up to and catch a group that's up the road ahead of you. You also build a little team spirit among your little group as you work together...

Tom

[SlowButSteady]

I've basically chosen to just ride alone.

I'm faster than a recreational bike rider and slower than a cyclist.

I mean, why should I load up my bike and drive somewhere to join a group ride when I'm a mile behind the group after less than five minutes? That makes no sense, so I ride alone.

I cover okay distances. But it takes me over 2 1/2 hours to cover a distance that some of them are covering in an hour.

Sometimes I look down and I'm clipping along at 20+mph. Sometimes I look down and I'm going 12.

This is my 4th year of cycling. I have a great bike. I even like to ride up hills.

I'm just failing to progress.

[aicabsolut]

I sometimes ride with a group that is much faster than me. Usually, I just hang on for dear life and hope I don't cramp up or bonk. They only really smoke me on the county line sprints, but luckily they regroup very slowly after those. Some of the guys are really nice and will give me a push now and then or drop back and help me catch back on if I'm struggling. Riding with them makes me push myself harder than I think I can. It has made me faster. It keeps getting easier to keep up with them, and they notice. If they're good guys, they will help you out when they see you are really putting in the effort. I'm sure there was a time when they were between pace groups. Maybe don't ride with them every time. Do the easier ride sometimes and the hammerfest sometimes. Try to make friends with them, and if they still don't want you there, then find a new group. If you are dropping back by 5 minutes, you should just drop back to the slower group. If you're constantly opening a gap, then you are probably not ready for this group either. If you can hang on most of the time but struggle on some hills or with some really fast surges, then you probably ought to be there, but you will need a little help sometimes. Riding solo is a good way to work on the mental aspect of suffering, but if you really want to get faster, you need to try to hang with people who are faster. It is, in my experience, the most effective way. However, they need to be just fast enough that you have a chance. They force you to put in efforts that you may not think you can do solo. If you can fight for the right wheel, you can get the benefit of a good draft that will help you save some energy over the course of the ride. If you're always way off the back, then you are really just training alone.

[Crankin]

I'm like Slow But Steady. Except that I've been riding for 8 years. I guess I could progress if I really trained for it, but while most think I have tons of discipline, I don't want to do something that would take the fun out of cycling for me. I ride alone, with my husband (who pushes me), or with a friend who is slower than me. I do ride with one group that is purely social and has an average speed that is a bit slower than mine. But there is always a "fast" segment of this group; fast is relative here. I have the respect of the faster riders, even though most of them have been riding forever and do long distance rides on a more regular basis than me. I can climb as well as almost all of these people, so that helps my confidence.
One part of me says that I am fine for an "old lady" who didn't start until her late forties and the other part of me says I'm a slug.
The only time I really train is during the winter. And that's just so I don't die on March 1st...

[indysteel]

And what if the fast group is on a sort of if you can't keep up, you shouldn't come kick?

Out of curiosity, what's their rationale for this attitude? Is there a no-drop policy so somebody has to stay back with you? Do you know the route and/or is it marked? Do they feel guilty or something if they drop people? Is this a formal training ride or a group of friends?

The training rides in my city don't have a no-drop policy. Anybody who wants to try to stay with the group is welcome to ride, regardless of whether they can/do. Ride leaders keep an eye out for anybody who might be new or in trouble, but otherwise we're on our own if we fall behind. I, for one, don't feel guilty if someone gets dropped and on the flip side of that, I don't expect anybody to slow down for me if I'm struggling (although it's nice when they do).

I agree with aicabsolut that riding with a group that is faster than you is the easiest way to get faster, although interval training can help, too. Learning how to smartly ride in a pack helps you stay with the group too, i.e., knowing where to position yourself, knowing where and when the group tends to surge or sprint, knowing how to make the most of a draft, etc. Finally, in my experience, certain skills are important in staying with the pack as well, like cornering.

In my limited experience (getting faster so that I could ride with friends who tend to be faster than me was my raison d'etre last year), training to get faster takes a lot of patience. I made a little progress summer year before finally giving up a bit from burn out during the fall. Over the winter, I hit my spinning classes hard and rode with some faster friends on rides that were social for them but harder workouts for me. Lo and behold, when I started going to my training ride this past April, I had finally got measurably faster. I got smarter about how to do the training ride, too.

I still ride alone here and there, too. I try my best to mix up my rides, whom I ride with and at what speed. Too much of any one thing makes me cranky.

[BleeckerSt_Girl]

Here's a little tip I learned which is I think starting to make me a little faster, plus it strengthens my legs....

On my older bike, the Shimano hubs are almost silent when I coast along without pedaling, so whether or not I am pedaling my bike is pretty quiet.
On my new bike, when i coast the hubs make a clicking/buzzing noise. At first I didn't like it much, but then I got used to it and thought it reminded me of crickets, kind of a strangely satisfying sound. But then the crickets made me more aware of just how often I was coasting without pedaling. It was often. So now I play a little game with myself and try to keep the "crickets" quiet by pedaling as much as I can as opposed to automatically coasting whenever I can.

So, if you want to increase your average speed, try to avoid coasting.

[Cyclesome]

What is considered fast? How Fast do you want to be?

[cmac77354]

What is considered fast? How Fast do you want to be?

That's what I'd like to know too. I consider myself a slower rider, I'm comfortable around 20 miles per hour on flats with a group. When I ride alone, which is the majority of the time I hang around 18 mph or so.

[BleeckerSt_Girl]

What is considered fast? How Fast do you want to be?

'Fast' is very different for different people depending on lots of factors, but how flat or hilly the area they ride in will be a major factor.
In general, someone who lives in Florida is going to be way faster than someone who lives in hilly parts of Vermont, all other factors being equal.

[aicabsolut]

It doesn't really matter how fast "fast" is. The OP just wanted to get faster so that she can hang with group A, because group B doesn't really challenge her. No matter where your starting point is, I will still say that intervals and plain old time on the bike will help your fitness and speed improve, but riding with faster people is the quickest and most effective way to really challenge yourself so that you see some speed improvements sooner. "Sooner" may still mean months, which is why you don't necessarily want to ride with the superfast crowd all the time--that gets demoralizing. But it is good for you if you want to get faster. You just need to pick a group that you can *almost* hang with--whether everyone would consider them "fast" is irrelevant. They are just that one step faster than you at that time. Maybe it's the "A" level group, maybe not.

[Wahine]

I have a friend and he is very tall and also very nice. I have confided in him that I want to get faster so what we do is we ride... he is waaaaaaaaaay faster than I am but he creates the most beautiful draft. If I want to stay in that sweet draft I have to pay attention and work very hard sometimes, then I get to rest a bit as I draft off of him. If he drops me, he always slows down and picks me back up again, he knows his job is to keep me going and motivated and he's nice enough to indulge me. My goal is to ride with him once a week like this, then maybe one day I'll be able to hang out with the big kids. (I'm stuck between groups as well).

[OakLeaf]

In general, someone who lives in Florida is going to be way faster than someone who lives in hilly parts of Vermont, all other factors being equal.

Or, a snowbird like me will find that her flat winter rides average 5-6 mph faster than her hilly summer rides, without an appreciable change in strength