Are you in a cycling club?

[Stick on a Giant]

We're not a 'proper' club - we meet at a pub carpark at 7pm, go off in various groups, usually meet at a pub 1/2 way round, and back to the starting pub for food (£6, no choice) at about 9.45. No membership or anything like that. Some of us go out at weekends together, some are members of other clubs to do TTs etc and we'll always wait/go slow for whoever's slowest.

Both Mrs G and I have found that riding with a club has helped our cycling, made us faster etc. Even though it's not a race, you can't help being a bit competetive with other riders around. I find the only people who say 'I'm not competetive' are the ones who CAN'T compete. Usually once they get a bit fitter and realise they can, in some small way, compete, they do!

 

[Saddle bum]

Yes. GS Avanti, in S London. Good bunch of people. They organise different ability groups from novice to a mid-week chain gang. They even organise an end of year Ruff Stuff event off-road.

I'm also a CTC member and if there was a militant cyclist's rights organisation, I'd join that as well.

 

[Keith Oates]

Yes, one well supported club in Manila and a couple in China, although they are fairly small and have only a few regular active members ATM!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

 

[mr_hippo]

There were two clubs back home - one racing and one touring. I am built for comfort and not for speed! The touring club had a runs list which was graded in terms of difficulty/distance and we also had a hard section. The destination for both sections was the same, the difference being the route taken.
When we had inexperienced riders with us, someone would chaperone them and for the first few runs they would go as far as the first stop which in our case was the Eureka at Two Mills - I think every cyclist in the Merseyside/Cheshire area knows it. If the novice and chaperone were dropped, it did not matter because the chaperone knew the route. I think there's nothing worse than being alone, dropped and not knowing where you are. As the weeks went by and they got better, they went on full runs.
The young ones who were not for enough for the hard section but wanted to speed off were told that they could go ahead but they must wait at the next T-junction or crossroads and they were happy to do that. Only once did a rider not follow the instruction and wait but all of us thought that he knows his way home and has gone. How wrong we were! Alan, the then chairman, had a phone call from a distraught father saying that his son had not returned. Club members with cars and three police forces (Merseyside, Cheshire & North Wales) searched for him but it all ended happily!