Originally Posted by
lhbernhardt
I agree with not coasting. Riding in a pace line is like driving a race car: the most important thing is to be SMOOTH. Suddenly coasting is not smooth. Keep the legs moving, even if they're not dong anything, or if you must coast, reduce leg speed gradually. Suddenly stopping the legs often sends the wrong message to riders behind.
If you've ever ridden in a pace line on the track, you quickly learn that it's the smoothness of the rider in front of you that dictates how close you can get to his wheel. The smoother the rider immediately ahead, the closer to his wheel you can ride. When I get into an unfamiliar pace line, I'm sometimes an entire wheel-length behind the rider ahead just because I can tell he's not smooth. He suddenly starts coasting, thinking it's a cool way to control his speed without braking. If I can, I'll work my way around him.
We clearly have different understandings of the term "coasting". If you are not exerting any pressure on the rear sprockets through the drivetrain, you are coasting in my book, whether or not your legs are going round. "Soft pedalling", where I come from, describes only that very precise point at which your rotation of the pedals is at exactly the pace which matches your current speed so you can feel the tension in the chain but make little or no contribution to your speed. I'll very rarely stop turning the pedals unless we're on a significant downhill. But I'll sometimes be coasting, even though the pedals are going round.