Group Riding Speed and more - Proposed Pacing Guide by Mr. Gadget

[Mr. Gadget]

Group Riding Speed Rating - Proposed Pace System by Mr. Gadget

First of all I can't wait to read the banter from everyone that the Newbie is even suggesting such a pacing system    This is only a proposed Pace System all ideas and improvements are welcome. Thanks in advance for looking this system over.

This was created out of being nicely slapped around by certain people that were looking to keep the new guy on the straight and narrow    New riders want to fit in and knowing this simple type of pacing system will help them hook-up with the right riding groups.  This will also help with safety and prevent riders trying to keep up and ride outside their comfort zone.

I noticed that no one else has been properly describing the speed parameters lately specified in the "Please Read Before Posting A Ride" post for their rides. So, to make things easier I came up with four ratings from P1 to P4 and then everyone knows what pace and kind of ride the leader of the ride does or has planned.

For example: Vince would be at Pace 1 leader    and Allon might be at Pace 1 in the morning and at Pace 3 after lunch or on the last leg of the day    or say some BMW Sport Touring person wants to lead a Pace 4 ride as a Fall Colors tour 
 
Pace 1 or P1
Populated / Main Roads (Speed limit + up to 30 mph over)
Rural / Back Roads (Speed limit + up to 40 mph over) 
Curves (Posted speeds x 2 + another up to 10 mph ?
Stops for fuel and breaks for up to 15 minutes every 100 to 140 miles or up to 2.0 hours in the saddle

Pace 2 or P2
Populated / Main Roads (Speed limit + up to 20 mph over)
Rural / Back Roads (Speed limit + up to 30 mph over) 
Curves (Posted speeds x 2)
Stops for fuel and breaks for up to 20 minutes every 90 to 120 miles or up to 1.5 hours in the saddle

Pace 3 or P3
Populated / Main Roads (Speed limit + up to 10 mph over)
Rural / Back Roads (Speed limit + up to 20 mph over) 
Curves (Posted speeds x 1.5 to x 2)
Stops for fuel and breaks for up to 20 minutes every 80 to 100 miles or up to 1.25 hours in the saddle
+ Quick stops at points of interest (photos and a quick drink)

Pace 4 or P4
Populated / Main Roads (Speed limit + up to 5 mph over)
Rural / Back Roads (Speed limit + up to 15 mph over) 
Curves (Posted speeds up to x 1.5)
Stops for fuel and breaks for up to 30 minutes every 80 to 100 miles or up to 1.25 hours in the saddle
+ Stops at points of interest (Photos, Walk around, Snack and a drink up to 30 minutes)

MPH is based on GPS speed not speedometer which normally shows higher speed than actual speed. (Most bikes speedometers read 3-10% above the actual speed and vary in this range based on your speed. Slower speeds like 30 MPH might be right on and then as you speed up the percentage off takes over)

Stop time for Breakfast, Lunch and Dinner vary and usually include fueling up.

On bigger rides like TWISTAR people can go with the leader based on their Pace number.  I know on my 1st group ride last year with the MN-MSTA at the Tri-State Boogie I wasn't sure what group to go with and since I have a ST1100 someone suggested I go with a slow group.  I opted to go with Allon's group that morning and he was burning it up at P1 pace way too fast for the new guy.  So, then I got with another group at one of the fuel stops and they were just right at P2 to P3 pace.

I hope this will help ride leaders and new or newer riders to decide which rides to go on and / or what group of riders to go out with at a big group event.

[Ray916MN]

The idea is everyone has a route sheet or route file and therefore the only pace they need to pay attention to is the pace they want to ride. This is fundamental to riding your own ride, which is fundamental to group ride safety.

Declare a ride pace and that means anyone and everyone who shows up implicitly needs to ride the declared pace of the ride or the group. How is that promoting ride your own ride. What are you going to do if they don't ride the declared pace?

What's the pace of the ride? It needs to be whatever an individual rider feels comfortable with and wants to ride at, not what a ride organizer or leader declares.

Lastly, if you're the organizer or leader and you declare a ride pace, realize that you are increasing your legal liability for accidents on the ride. That your prescription of a ride pace, indicated that the route could be taken at the prescribed pace. You open the door for a participant to put forth the argument that the ride pace was too fast and that is why they crashed. It can be argued that you also stated that everyone is supposed to ride their own pace, but if this is the case, what is the point of declaring a ride pace? The AMA Risk Management course which is required to be completed by organizers of AMA sanctioned rallies implicitly advises against these types of statements by ride organizers and workers because of the legal liability they create.

There has been over a decade of discussion on this topic on this forum and its predecessor and I think the preceding pretty much summarizes where the discussion ended up.

Anyone should feel free to state what pace they personally intend to ride at on a ride, but that is very different than the ride organizer stating that a ride will run at a given pace.

So why does the "please read before posting a ride" article say suggest posting a ride pace if appropriate? Because if you run a ride without a route sheet, people need to know the pace, because the only way they are going to know where the route goes is to keep up. Most people don't post ride paces with their rides because they provide route sheets for their rides and they expect the people who show up for their rides to be able to ride the route at their own pace.

Make sense?

[pkpk]

I know on my 1st group ride last year with the MN-MSTA at the Tri-State Boogie I wasn't sure what group to go with and since I have a ST1100 someone suggested I go with a slow group. .............I hope this will help ride leaders and new or newer riders to decide which rides to go on and / or what group of riders to go out with at a big group event.

The irony here is....as the leader of the "slow" group on that Boogie Ride last year, we still wound up being the first ones at the lunch stop.  Nothing beats following a leader with a reliable GPS with the accurate routing so no time is wasted making wrong turns or backtracking.

But yeah, when you were stating that you did not necessarily want to ride "slow" and started showing me your ground down metal parts, I encouraged you to join the faster group.  But here is the deal....with a group of familiar riders, I'm not that slow and I have plenty of LEO awards to prove it.  It's when I have unfamiliar riders that I tend to keep a sedate pace and wait at most intersections for everyone to gather.  This winds up being sort of tedious and does make the pace feel slow.  As Ray said, when you start assigning riders a ranking, there winds up creating a mental frame for that rider to maintain a specific pace.

Back when I had a VFR, I could ride well over my head with a comfortable feeling.  But pace was rather streaky, not something I could sustain all day long.  I enjoyed being able to decide when and where I would get into that zone, and I could not deal with having to maintain a predefined pace.  This is one reason why I generally would ride alone, or with only a few others at the most.  I found myself stressed trying to lead faster riders on extended higher speed pace or frustrated while trying to lead slow riders all afternoon. 

If anything, I found we should break groups up into map reading skills.  Those who can't read maps, read route sheets or use a GPS are encouraged to follow guys who call themselves 'Mr. Gadget.'   

[gdawgs]

many ride for the "freedom" it gives us.  more rules are counter productive. 

i don't see any problem with riding your own ride, and people waiting at intersections. 

let it go.......nothing is broken.   

[Jared]

Lastly, if you're the organizer or leader and you declare a ride pace, realize that you are increasing your legal liability for accidents on the ride. That your prescription of a ride pace, indicated that the route could be taken at the prescribed pace. You open the door for a participant to put forth the argument that the ride pace was too fast and that is why they crashed.

This.  Having prescribed groups who by definition will be breaking the law in varying degrees is not a great idea from a risk perspective.  Making people responsible for their own actions and decisions is the only way to go here.

let it go.......nothing is broken.   

And this too.

[Ray916MN]

There is a question/point which I failed to address in my previous post, and that question is how do people find the right group of people for them to ride with on a ride.

The answer depends. It depends on who shows up for a ride, how many people show up for a ride, what the ride organizer wants to do and/or can do to support a ride, how people want to ride on a given day and time and lastly it depends how all these things come together. Given that rides are organized and led by volunteers, there isn't any way I've found to organize a ride where any given rider is going to be assured a good riding group match with all the depends.

So how do you find the best fit possible when there are multiple groups of riders on a ride? Be prepared to ride your own ride by being prepared to ride the route while self navigating. Ask the ride organizer for help in finding a match. Be specific and honest about the pace you like to ride. Do not use qualitative terms to describe the pace you like to ride like fast or slow. Use empirical terms like 10+ on straights and 1.5 marked speed in turns. If the organizer isn't much help, be the first person out on the route and let groups pass you on the road. Follow them and see if you like the pace they are running. Hook on the back of a group which is running a pace you feel comfortable with and if you don't find such a group, ride solo. If you know people who ride at a pace you like to ride, make your own riding group by inviting them to go on the ride with you.

Be patient. Sometimes you find a group which fits the pace you want to run perfectly, sometimes you find a group which is close but not perfect and sometimes you find you have to form your own group. You can't expect a ride organizer to ensure that a ride will have a group that runs at the pace any given rider wants to run, so be prepared to figure it out or make it happen for yourself.

Simply put, all this nets to ride your own ride and be responsible for your ride. While it is nice when an organizer manages to make it easy for participants to find an appropriate group to ride with on a ride, there are too many depends for any volunteer organizer to do this and there is no pace rating system in the world that is going to assure that it won't depend.

[aschendel]

I like what Mr. Gadget is trying to do, and also agree that most of what followed is the way it ends up working in the real world (and the real world can definitely be frustrating for organizers, leaders and followers).

Until I know the leader / ride style I have a very different goal: figure out what's going on here.  I don't show up with any pretense about having fun or expecting (but I'm always hoping) people to do what I'd like to do; my mentality is strictly trying learn about the people / ride, not fall down (i.e. be safe enough) and fit in.  After I learn what I need to (seldom on the 1st ride, and I don't always do a 2nd) then my goal changes: have at least as much fun as the leader is having.  If it's a well-meshed group and everything's working well, I have fun riding; if anyone or anything is making it hard for the leader, I do whatever I can to assist, regardless of what that means for "my ride".

Life is short, group riding well is really, really difficult.  The ultimate group ride for me is probably a track day.  The roads are awesome, nobody gets lost and anyone who falls, runs out of gas or breaks down isn't far from help, and I generally don't have to be too involved; although sometimes the views get old and the food generally sucks.  Aside from that, each ride I've been on or organized ends up having its own dynamic and almost never fits perfectly into any kind of mold.

Good leaders need good followers, and good leaders can't be solely concerned with having the same fun as riding solo - which is why people get burned out of leading.  And good followers can't be assured they will have the same fun as riding solo - which is why people get burned out of following.

I would like to point out that if I'm leading, my ideal pacing won't fit your categories very well (that's not criticism).  I'd say (vs. do ):

P3: Populated / Main Roads (Speed limit + up to 10 mph over)
P3: Rural / Back Roads (Speed limit + up to 20 mph over) 
P1: Curves (Posted speeds x 2 + another up to 10 mph ?)
P1: Stops for fuel and breaks for up to 15 minutes every 100 to 140 miles or up to 2.0 hours in the saddle
In towns (Speed limit + up to 5 mph under)

Or I'd sum it up as "I'm going to go 65-85ish and I won't slow down for much so pay attention, I'll wait at the confusing turns but here's a sheet, follow it even if you can see the person in front of you - let me know if you ever feel that you are in over your head.  Who's got the shortest range (fuel, bladder, food)?  Are you sure?  Ok, we'll stop __________ for __________.   Any Questions?"

This forum is pretty small and it tends to be a good place to find people that can aren't too stubborn (or should I say are stubborn in ways I appreciate), people who have a similar idea about what a good time looks like: the boonies on a bike.

a.s.

[tk]

Interesting discussion. My rding style when leading doesn't neatly fit into a P1 - P4 format. Way too many variables. I'm in P1 on a smooth twisty road that I like. Maybe P2 or P3 if the road surface is beat up or has pea gravel in some blind corners near the apex. I might be P4 if my lunch didn't settle well. All this  can occur on the same ride. Much depends on my perception of the threat from law enforcement also. If the road surface is wet I would tend to a higher P level. The condition of my tires is also a factor. So it is conceivable I could lead a 200 mile ride and move between all 4 P levels. That is why I don't announce a pace when I post a ride. I just don't know how I am going to ride on any given day.

[flyinlow]

Couple things I don't get from some of the comments in this post and in other posts over the course of a year. If the goal is that everyone follows a route sheet and rides their own pace, then is there a need for a "leader" and "followers"? I understand everyone starting from a given point and given time so that everyone ends up at a gas stop or lunch break at relatively the same time. I also understand if a route sheet is not given out that you would then indeed have a leader and followers. Just trying to figure out when you really need a leader and when you don't.

So if I posted up a ride, gave out route sheets and told everyone to ride their own ride, I know I would not be leading the ride because there would be people much faster than me on the route. I also would not expect people faster than me to stay behind me, thats not an enjoyable ride for them. So in that case, what would be expected of a ride "leader"?

Just trying to understand the principles at work here. Mr. Gadget, good ideas although I think I'm more in the camp of less rules and to TK's and Lloyds points, over the course of a ride you may fall into various classifications depending on time of day, your fatigue factor and the roads/terrain you are on.

[Greg]

Couple things I don't get from some of the comments in this post and in other posts over the course of a year. If the goal is that everyone follows a route sheet and rides their own pace, then is there a need for a "leader" and "followers"?

Good point. Be cognizant that most posts don't use those words. For example, when I put together a ride I now use the term "organizer". 
On "official" MSTA rides there by default really isn't a "leader" per se. If someone wants to put together an ad hoc ride, then they may use whatever descriptive words they deem fit.

[Tim...]

Route sheets are, IMHO, dangerous as they take your focus off the road.   

[Deplorable, thank you!]

"Couple things I don't get from some of the comments in this post and in other posts over the course of a year. If the goal is that everyone follows a route sheet and rides their own pace, then is there a need for a "leader" and "followers"?"

-Because far too many take for granted they will be paraded around by a "leader".

-Because far too many are incapable of following a route sheet while they ride, some for the logic and reasoning Tim states.

-Because part of the learning process of the organization , the rides, the roads and how to read and ride at the same time is being paraded around while you establish these skills (hopefully you are not just "following the leader" you are actually looking at the route sheet and knowing when and where to expect the next turns, that you are learning some of the regularly routed roads etc...so you someday do not require a leader to parade you around.

"when I put together a ride I now use the term "organizer"."
-Yes Greg we have all seen your recent, "organizing not leading" ride posts...lol

"So if I posted up a ride, gave out route sheets and told everyone to ride their own ride"
-Half the problem there is that most people don't understand what "ride your own ride" means.     
 -They don't have the necessary skills to actually know there true riding limitations and then have enough self control to actually stay within those limits.
Most of this is because they have never learned proper riding skills and techniques, because it "isn't required". The vast majority of riders I see, stopped learning as soon as they figured out how to  twist the throttle and squeeze the brake. They have no understanding how to turn or steer or how body position affects it all, .....................and I could go on for hours, days, weeks, months......

Of course these are only my opinions and don't reflect what anyone or any organizational leaders may feel , see or say.

And while a route sheet certainly does take your eyes off the road more than anyone would desire (especially if you didn't write it or it is overly complicated) they are necessary (or a talking GPS) in order for most of the ride participants to get from point A to point B and be "self sufficient" in there own navigating and oace etc....Otherwise they do have to "follow the leader" and ride at the leaders pace or be left behind....

[Ray916MN]

If you look closely you will see that the majority of people post rides as organizers, not as leaders. A subtle but important distinction.

While organizers may end up a leading groups on rides the distinction being made is one of emphasis. The emphasis is not on people leading rides, which implies that everyone rides in one big group and that people can ignore route sheets and depend on ride leaders to lead them, but on organizing rides so people can ride however and with whomever they want.

Of course if you're riding in a group, whoever is at the head of the group is leading, but the intent here is for anyone and everyone in a given group to be prepared and capable of leading so if they want they can lead, they can break away from the group, or they can help the leader keep a group on route. When I lead, I love it when someone comes by and takes over leading and when I'm following, I like to pass and take over leading at times. Makes a ride much more interesting when there are different leaders and riders in a group shuffle the group order during a ride.

A declared leader make it seem like no one else is allowed to lead and everyone else must follow.

Route sheets are distracting and can be difficult to follow. Thank god for GPS units......

[aschendel]

Operator: Hello 911, where are you?
"Follower": I have NO IDEA, I can't (or chose not to) follow the route sheet.

Not being aware of where you are and how to either proceed forward or backward from your current position is extraordinarily shortsighted (not to mention "needy").  Not being able to take at most $1 of your hypothetical $10 to follow your sheet probably is an indication that you're riding beyond your limits.

Also, at the risk of being misinterpreted and misunderstood, if I can't see or be seen with the group on a ride, I most likely won't bother hanging around.  The only upsides (coming to mind) to running someone else's route sheet basically solo is learning new roads (nothing to scoff at) and small talk at breaks.  Almost worth it with you guys and your routes, but not quite, for me.  I want to see other people in my group and be seen in a group by others.

a.s.

p.s. I also dig it when other people are willing to lead sections of rides that I organize that they either know or are easy enough to learn.  Mixing up the rider order is great and I love when it happens.

[pkpk]

Also, at the risk of being misinterpreted and misunderstood, if I can't see or be seen with the group on a ride, I most likely won't bother hanging around.  .....  I want to see other people in my group and be seen in a group by others.order is great and I love when it happens.

I had to LOL on this one.  My one and only official MNSBR ride, I showed up with my ST1100 while the rest were all sportbikes.  I laughed because I already knew how this "group ride" was going to turn out.  Sure enough, within 5 minutes of starting the ride, I could see all 25 bikes in a train about 1 mile ahead of me in the valley below.  I did my own ride that day.