Looks like the T-1 / T-2 ride split up is now working really well, after last weeks confusion when we had people dropping off big time from both rides, ending up with some people being escorted along the Mounts bay Bike Path and a bit of ‘discussion’ and frustration at the coffee shop . . . . . Still have to finalise details with El Prez but looks like theT-2 ride will have one or two standard ride routes – aiming for about 37 klms with a couple of hills and typical pack speed on the flat of 25-35 (depending on the wind direction). This ride will cater for newish riders who have come up from the Developers Group on their rise up to the heady heights of the T-1 group.

T-2 will have more catch up / re-group points than T-1, and the general aim of improving basic safe riding skills and group etiquette rather than pushing riders to the limit. The focus will be on keeping the ride group working together, particularly on the flat and windy sections or along Mounts Bay Rd, and making sure that if anyone’s flagging at the back that they are looked after and not dropped off and left stranded.

Whilst this may mean that some fitter new riders feel they won’t get a work-out – there’s always the opportunity to sit on the front and pair up with the ride leader into a head wind, or push harder up the hills and sit up and wait for the others at the re-group point.

We’ll try and arrange for more roll-throughs too, which is something that traditionally gets taught on the Development Group rides. 6 out of today’s 10 riders hadn’t done it before and whilst ironically it’s harder to do with a slower pack, you have to learn this skill sometime, as its an essential pack riding technique and you’ll need to have a good level of confidence in doing it when you move up into the next group – plus its a real buzz when it works well.

The overall success of today’s ride was the result of 3 critical factors:
• El Prez’s pre-ride briefing and getting people to correctly choose which of the two Transition groups to ride in.
• Group size – we had 10 today and probably 12 is a comfortable maximum.
• Experienced riders joining in to help.

The third point is probably the most critical;  Leon and Dan joined today’s group and their experience made a huge difference to stabilising the pack out on the road.  Leon consitantly sat back to give a wheel, protection and encouragement to a couple of the back markers, and Dan looked after the middle of the pack or paired up and sat on the front to help push through into the head wind – so a big thanks to both of them.

But we do need other SPR riders to occasionally drop back down a level of two to ensure that there’s always a minimum of two and preferably three (for T-2) experienced riders helping out or leading the Transition Rides.

I’ll be away for the next two weekends and Leon has offered to run T-2 next week so step up and offer to give him a hand.

Cheers Mark _S