Originally Posted by
cvall91
Yes it is the Doral ride. I assume the way I typed that made the ride sound dangerous and inconsiderate. Let me try this again. I joined the group a month ago as I moved to that area. This ride has been going on for quite some time (I don't know how long but more than a year) every Saturday. The ride consists of two groups, one leaves from a nearby town and joins the Doral group and we head off. Here is a link to the description of the ride
http://doralcyclingclub.com/index.ph...d=14&Itemid=13. Starts at 7:30 Saturdays so traffic is already at a minimum. From what I've noticed, the people who planned the route chose the roads with the least amount of traffic and disturbance. We always take up just one lane unless we are turning left or doing loops. Since the group is rather large, stopping half the group and trying to regroup after every light would be a mission. We stop when the light is already red or turning red. If it is green, we go as normal. If the light happens to turn red while we are still crossing, we signal to the drivers to let them know, and this only takes about 5-10 seconds to finish crossing. Here is a video of on of the rides someone recorded
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QMwS-hrEyzc. As mentioned by someone else who rides in it. It is a very safe ride. If it wasn't, all those people wouldn't ride in it. It's not just mass chaos causing havoc around the streets with complete disregard of traffic laws. Hope that cleared things up a bit.
I saw 1/2 of the youtube video and couldn't watch anymore because it made me too angry.
This looks like a ride for every narcissistic cyclist in the area. How can cyclists campaign to ask drivers to "share the road" when there are videos like this that show cyclists acting like they own the road. Near the beginning, it looks like there's even a bike lane or a fairly wide shoulder and yet these folks insist on taking up an entire car lane riding anywhere from 3-5 abreast. At several points it's clear that they are taking up more than one lane. Overall, it's a pretty pathetic display of selfish behavior that constitutes nothing more than an organized middle finger to the drivers. Problem is this kind of behavior hurts the rest of us who try to return the courtesy that overwhelming majority of drivers show us.