Originally Posted by
noimagination
A couple of years ago, I got caught up in the GFNY going North through a part of Haverstraw while I was on a ride (if I'd known the ride was that day, I'd have chosen a different route). I was with a clump of 80 or so riders, and I couldn't get away from them fast enough. JHFC, the stupidity I saw in those 5 minutes still boggles my mind. Later in my ride (North Mountain Road, on my way back) I got passed by the front group, about 15 or so riders, they were fine (for the couple of seconds it took them to pass me).
IME, the maximum number of riders in a "good" group is around 6 or so. Much beyond that, the likelihood that there is at least one a**hole who doesn't know what the feck they're doing approaches unity. Of course, I'm too slow to keep up with the really expert riders, so I'm sure this doesn't hold true for many faster groups.
It's not just the riders on these events that are a boneheads, some of the volunteers are downright dangerous.
Locally there is a large event that uses many of my favorite routes. I usually avoid the area the day of the event, but a few of times I've ended up on the route as the event was going on. Every time I've ended up on their route I've had some overzealous volunteer try to "direct" me to someplace I didn't want to go.
One time they were pulling the riders off onto the shoulder and then as a group have them cross the road to head the wrong way down a one-way street. I was continuing on down the road, but a volunteer ran out into the road to make sure I got with the group. He was so far out in the road I had to choose to either ride into oncoming traffic or to hit him. I hit him. Hard. After I got done yelling at the volunteers with a long string of fn-heimers the officer that was there to direct traffic reminded the volunteers that they couldn't attempt to stop anyone.
Another time a volunteer actually chased me down and tried to force me off the road in his pickup truck because I "missed" the turn. Dumb-dumb couldn't believe that there would actually be other cyclist out that weren't participating in the event. My understanding is that the guy was still perplexed and didn't understand what he did was wrong after the police talked to him. (I had phoned his license in.)
Another time I pulled up to a traffic light and saw a whole bunch of riders coming from my right and turning down the route I planned on taking. I asked the one of the officers there if this was the event route, he said yes, so I decided to double back on the route I had just taken. About a mile down the road a car pulled off in front of me. As I went by the car door flew open and the some woman started screaming at me that I was going the wrong way. Since I had my camera on that ride I sent the video to the police and the event organizer. The police responded by saying they talked to the woman about attempting to injure a cyclist by dooring them but that was about the most they could do. The event organizer defended her actions saying they work hard to to prevent their participants from getting lost during the event.