The organized rides out of our shop were pretty much an insiders deal, if you weren’t a tested experienced rider known to the rest of the group or a visiting pro you just didn’t know the when and where.

That doesn’t mean that there weren’t lots of other group rides some hosted by ROMP and others by customers. Then some beginner rides for new bike owners that were more like training rides to show them where the trail heads were and what to expect on each of those trails. It seemed that all rides in Los Gatos convened at the Coffee Roaster for pre trail discussion and then moved up the street to the Velomeister for last minute adjustments and departure. Sometimes a group would leave and a few would say behind to then take a plebe up onto death&dying for an initiation ride, and then be waiting for the rest at the ridge or some other pre arraigned spot like the emergency ward.

For the advertised weekend group rides it was the Bicycle Outfitter, a much larger store that always had two levels of rides open to anyone. They always started together with a sprint down a four mile stretch of service road that skirted the expressway. The riders that didn’t get dropped were allowed to ride in the advanced group.