Originally Posted by noisebeam
I did have great fun one time when I passed a cyclist going quite a bit slower, he grabed on my wheel and a few miles later a third cyclist did and we had a very fast paceline going for a few more miles. But compete with others? Never possible as we are going different places and for different distances and never even agreed that there was a race going on.
Al
That's one of the pleasures of everyday commuting, sometimes you build an informal paceline that just rocks!
Aside from all the stop and start politics and jockeying (which merits a whole different thread!),
running tight as a group of commuters makes sense to me for a couple of reasons. One is there's strength in numbers.
Second, you present a larger group to other motorists. There is a certain synergy acheived here on the streets of Seattle when two riders take the lane on a downtown street and hold it for 10 or more city blocks. Also, right hooks are tougher for drivers to consider.
It can also be a little less competitive if everyone is dancing around the same obstacles. A certain flow develops with the riders all meshing as a group. You certainly see this in pacelines, but also happens during commutes with a lot of other cyclists.
I've seen this out on the ski slopes as well, as a ski instructor. You run a drill where everyone skis en masse, back and forth in a tight little swarming school of skiers, like a school of fish, with no single skier in the lead or in the rear all the time, and it works amazingly well. Humans have incredible spatial ablities in movement.
a third reason to ride en masse is you get to check out all the other riders if they're cute and try to chat them up.
I like riding in a commuting paceline, or like a school of fish, instead of the commuter race, but it is rare to have it happen here.