Originally Posted by
syciprider
And if you do, do you set aside your rules of the road/traffic laws discipline for the sake of the paceline?
I did my first group road ride today (been an MTBer and commuter all this time) and I feel dirty all over. Sure my ave speed was faster and I got a good workout but running all those lights and stop signs just felt so wrong to me. I can definitely see that such behavior affects the public's perception of all cyclists.
I live near a very popular group ride route. Often I see the riders run a red light near a hill that crests from both directions. Just last week I thought this one cyclist was really going to get hit. I saw the car but the cyclist was too far back to see it and because it was early 6:00am I guess the cyclist thought he was the only one on the road and didn't even slow down through the red light. Luckily the driver had really good brakes. At this same intersection because the apex of the hill is so steep they have no left turn for the cars but plenty of times I see the cyclists use this lane to turn left.
Being a new cyclist I really find it distressing that some cyclists expect to share the road with cars but don't feel like they have to follow the same rules. Those types of incidents even when they don't result in accidents give the cyclists a bad reputation.