Jakey

Last year on STP I saw a paceline being led by like four tandems with about 15 singles hanging on... they must've been doing 32-35mph.... they were just screaming.

Taxman

I usually ride 18-21 avg alone. I have competed in just a few crits, but dont consider myself a true racer yet since I have been lapped in each one. In the local group rides though when I ride with the racing group, we usually go about 35 miles and avg about 20-24 depending on who is up front. Kinda flat to rolling. Nothing too steep and long. Sometimes they kick up to 35 for a few miles and I usually pop about 1 mile into that. LOL I have been riding since last summer and have gone a total of about 1000miles since I started. I had been off bikes for nearly 19 years.

55/Rad

Of the 206 miles, I'd estimate that 175 of it was in a large group where drafting was possible. Of course, I did my fair share of pulling as well.


Ranger - don't understimate yourself or the gains to be had with good weather. Are you riding alone? Get out into some group rides and the dynamics change - expect to push and be pushed a bit more than on a solo ride.

55/Rad

forum*rider

some-what average rider(did a few races and then stopped. Decided it wasn't my thing).

I can average 21-23mph on my regular 50mile route. If I have a partner to draft off of, that average goes up to 24-26mph.

Portis

Yeah, I've never ridden with anyone but myself. I plan to do some group rides in the near future. I also wonder if you guys take days off? I very rarely take a day off and wonder if I would be faster if i did. Keep in mind i have only had the bike for 9 days. I did take one day off because of rain last week. (rode trainer on other rainy day) I was faster the next day after i took off, in fact it was my fastest average so far.

I probably have averaged 1-2 days off per month over the last 18 months on my mountain bikes.

forum*rider

you will ne faster is you take a day off between rides. or if you just do a slow recovery ride.

Since I ride to school, I ride daily, but the rides are short and fairly slow(dualie mtb + 30lb of books isn't really great for speed.)

thad

I just started, I have about 230 miles on my bike. Today I did 25 miles at 17.5 MPH alone over rolling hills (not really flat, but no gut busting/long climbs) and some wind. I have about 25 lbs to loose, I hope to get better as the weight comes off.

Craig C

I rode 10 years ago for a couple of years (on a mountain bike) and then had kids (and stopped riding). I've just been getting back into it. I got a new road bike 4 weeks ago. I've put 220 miles on it. Average speeds differ dramatically depending on how much climbing I do. When it's flat I average 18-19 MPH. Today I did 37 miles with 3700 feet of climbing. Average speed was 15.2 MPH.

Tommyp

I just got a computer on my bike after riding for 9 months...
I find that I ride at about 18mph roundtrip to when I commute 8 miles each way.
On my last 2 rides, same 28 mile loop, I rode at 22mph when was alone just chilling out. My friends slowed me down to 18mph...
Looks like I need some new friends.

conundrumx

40 mile solo today in 2 hours and an easy to calculate 20 mph avg. Rolling terrain with a half dozen traffic lights to slow down for.

26mi235

I have a standard 25-mile loop with some rollers that I always try to ride 20+ on, and usually do (windy/early-season rides are harder). When I am in good shape I can do between 68-70 (21.5-22mph). However, this is a little mislading for comparison with others. First, I can be quite areo on the bike, which helps by at least 1 mph. Second, I am very light so I do not lose much time on the uphills and I use a race tuck so I go fast with little effort on decents. FInally, I take out stops. I made a deal with myself a awhile ago that I would do that so that I would not be so tempted to roll stop signs and make dangerous decisions to save time.

I have ridden consistently for 35 years and raced for a few years twenty years ago (I only did a few hill climbs a year, plus a few hilly road races). As far as drafting in a paceline goes, it is much faster than being on your own, but it depends on how good you are at it and how good the whole group is. When you get inexperienced riders in the group there tends to be a lot of accordian riding which diminishes the advantage. Also, strong cross winds take a toll, as there is not as much escape from the wind. Finally, the wind matters a fair bit (and out and back into/with the wind is a little less affected than always having a wind from the side, which always feels like you are having to fight a headwind all of the time).

nesdog

Gawd, I'd sure like to be as fast as a lot of you folks!

Yesterday, I rode 50 miles with a friend, 4500 feet of climbing averaging 13.5. I have a mostly flat 13 mile circuit that I do during lunch time. On that one, I'll average in the 16's. Push hard (and make all of the lights) and I've been able to average 17.4. For most of the regular rides, I probably average in the 14's.

Sheldon
OCR2

forum*rider

well 4500 is alot more climbing than I have in my 50mi route. I may have 2000ft of climbing at the most. Everything else is either downhill or flat.

Jakey

I was gonna say.... If I did a 50 mile ride with 4500ft, my avg would probably be like 8mph...

Hanzo

I've been riding for about a month, got about 375 miles on my computer so far. My average speed is 17.3.

genEus

can someone quickly explain what is "drafting?" (i could probably spend 20 minutes searching for it! )
thanks

C_Heath

now for an average biker, I get 15mph and I live in the foothills of NC real hilly


been ridin 9 months

C_Heath

drafting is when u pull up of someones rear wheel about a foot and ride behind them. You are in no wind, and can go just as fast and not spend much energy.

gl

nesdog

Thankfully, we had downhills! There are two very significant drops, one of those being about 2 miles with a peak 18% grade. For me, that's lots of brake time 'cause I don't wanna end up off the side of the mountain.

The bulk of the climbing was in the first 30 miles. By the end of that, we were at 11-1/2 average. We picked up the extra couple of mph in the flatter sections. Gotta love riding the Santa Monica range.

Sheldon

catatonic

cruising between 16-21mph. can dip down to 12 if dealing with some serious wind.

On my mountain bike....heh dream on...like 8....For some reason I'm unable to hold any speed on that thing anymore....prolly life's way of saying "give it up and get a fixie ya punk!!!"

mrog71

I'm a newb and have only been riding (seriously anyway) for about a month and I have a crappy bike and I'm fat (6'2" 263 lbs) and I've been averaging about 15.2 over the last month. I expect that as I lose weight and when I get a modern bike and as my legs get stronger I will speed up quite a bit.

We have a fair amount of hills around where I ride, and they are kicking my fat ass! BUT, I've lost 11 lbs over the last month and I'm hooked on cycling so I expect my avg speed to go up pretty quick.

KESTREL200EMS

16-24 mph. Flat with someone trying to catch me.

beppe

It's really not so bad. Really, I average about 16 on this ride.

khuon

I'm assuming you did the one-day ride? I know some huge crazy fast pacelines develop on the one-day option. I have only been doing the two-day rides but last year I found myself trying to bridge a big gap between a couple of riders in our group who took off early from a rest stop while the rest of us were busy eating breakfast sandwiches in Winlock. The two riders ahead were out of FRS range so we couldn't contact them to tell them we were quite a bit behind. I drew the short straw and got to perform the chase. I was cranking at around 25MPH and then got passed by a paceline of about 10 riders. I asked if I could hop on their wheel and they gave me the go-ahead. Pretty soon others were joining us and there was close to 30 riders humming along at near 30MPH. I was in the middle and hardly working at all. Before I knew it, I had passed the two riders I was trying to chase down and now they had to do the catching up. I thanked the paceline for the pull and dropped off to give my friends a chance.

My usual speed on the flats with no winds is somewhere between 18MPH to 22MPH. At those speeds, I'm comfortable enough to ride no hands and move around on the bike. I can easily carry on a conversation too so I figure that's my cruising speed. Anything much above that, I consider myself hammering. FWIW, the one thing about going too slow that I can't stand is that the sweat (especially from my forehead) never gets a chance to evaporate away and eventually pools up and runs down into my eyes.

teamawe

You ride 50 miles and your comp shows an average speed of 26? Or are you 'figuring' this average yourself? I'm thinking 2k ft of climbing in 50 miles at 23 average solo = pro-tour TT speeds.

I just did a ride yesterday, 58 miles with around 2k of vert gain and averaged 20.4, which is hauling ! Two tandems (numerous race records held by both teams) leading the way. 23 is about the fastest they have EVER done that loop in.

Previous day we did a century, I did 88 miles of it, 6k ft of climbing with a 16.8 average. Pacelined around 20 miles of that, rest solo.

Rad/55, my GF just did the Solvang Double, 9:47 ride time, 11:06 overall, rode her single with one of the above mentioned tandems.

BTW, averages dont mean much unless you are compairing yourself on the same course, heat, humidity, tire presure, etc, etc.