Weekly Rides.......Are they really just for fun!!!!!!

I have been debating all day whether I should put up this comment as I have only been on one Run (last night to Stonehaven).

Before I joined I had heard that the weekly runs were mainly for fun and that, normally there will be at least one group for the slower riders, so that they too can enjoy the ride.

However after last night I am not so sure.!!!!!

As my wife asked for a slow group and was therefore put in the last group. This group turned up in stonehaven with 4 Riders lost..(they did turn up about 5 mins later). So does the Mirror system really work.

When this group left Stonehaven it went off as group 4 which meant some of the slow riders who were originally in this group were now in other groups and therefore started holding up people in that group.

Hope you are managing to follow this....

When my wife got back to the Red Star..She was promptly told that she needs to ride faster and that if the limit is 60 then she should be doing that.

This was for both of us our First Run Out and only about the 3rd time my wife had been on her Bike since she past her test.

And although she would welcome any constuctive critisism about her riding. She does not feel that she should be forced to do a speed that she does not feel comfortable with.

We are both quite new to bikes and felt these rides would give us some valuable experience, and not Knock our confidence.

I look forward to any comments.


If the groups had left stonehaven in the correct order as they had left the Park & Ride this would have never been an issue.

Hello Oldmansteve (maybe not so old)

Its good that you made this post.

Does the mirrors system work? Yes it does but only as well as when the people in the group use it. The person in front of the last 4 riders should have slowed down and the group would have come back together. I can only assume that in this group there were some new members who did not fully understand the principle of the mirror system but it does work well when fully understood.
The speed of the run is a little more difficult. The majority of the riders will be able to ride quite happily between 50 and 60 miles an hour. As your wife has recently passed her test I assume that she may be lacking in confidence at this stage (we have all be there) and there for might find riding in a group a little challenging until she has more experience. She should certainly not ride faster than what she in comfortable with. I am sure in just a few weeks her confidence will increase quite a bit. We have all had to gain confidence after passing our tests. After passing ones test we then need to learn how to ride the bike and I am sure that you will both gain a lot of knowledge from speaking to other members in the club.

I hope this helps and I look forward to meeting you both on future runs

Dave

Mmm some very good points that really need to be answered by the committe.

The mirror system does work if implemented properly. Sometimes if riders are slower then there can be problems but technically it should work.

I have found that sometimes there can be a great diffrence in riders confidence .

The club is for a variety of riders from experianced to the lesser experienced.
The one thing i do not think it caters for especially on the first few rides of the season is
really novice riders as it gets dark early the run needs to be at a good steady pace.

Your comment on the return trip i would say you need to check on the run down the people that were in that group.So that when they start off again you are in the right group as they may leave 1st or last it is the same group of people you need to be in .

Hope your bad experiance has not put you both off the club.

Dave M beat me to the first post

Wise words Richard

Dave

Firstly I would like to thank everyone that has, and will hopefully continue to contribute to this debate.

We pride ourselves at the GMC in the way that we can have open discussions about anything at all, whether face to face or on the forum and would like to think that we take onboard the many comments we receive from our members throughout the year, and this will be no exception.

I would like, if I may to make a couple of personal comments regarding this, before we bring it up at the committe meeting.

What went wrong: From what I understand, it was obvious that the mirror system failed for you both on the night in that the rider in front of you didn't wait for you when he lost you in his mirrors, a fundemental failing on his part, and so at the next junction, if you don't know the route you are immediately 'lost'. This very event has happened on numerrous occasions to most of us when we used to operate a different system called the drop off system.

As for being advised to go faster, this advice no doubt would have been given with the very best of intentions without the knowledge of knowing that you wife had only ridden 3 times since passing her test, and without knowing that she had specifically requested to go into a group that would be going at a slower pace. We have been at great pains within the GMC not to designate a 'slow' or 'fast' group, as this is something we don't wish to promote either way. The 'correct' group for her confidence and ability is where we would like her to be until she feels at home moving from one group to another. We just need to communicate that a little better.

Some of the factors we will need to discuss:

1. Firstly we will bring this up at the next committee meeting, having gathered together all folks views and opinions, so keep them coming!

2. It perhaps should be remembered that this was the very first run out of the season, with everyone I'm sure looking forward to meeting up with old and new acquaintances. Its the reason we go in the first place, and perhaps this had some influence on the events.

3. For all the new riders, we should have perhaps made it clearer on the night how important the mirror system has to be operated to make it successful, although even for those of us that know this system well we can still get it wrong, as you can see from the events you have kindly brought to the forum.

4. Having had such a tremendous turnout of motorbikes on the night, I believe 37, I'm sure you will all agree that it is a daunting task for the chosen 'ride master or should that read victim' to select people, many that he has no previous knowledge of their experience, and put them together in groups to ride out with. (Something all the commitee members and press ganged individuals will have the pleasure of experiencing!)

5. We have tried to achieve this balance by making up the various groups on the night, those that want to maintain a good average speed throughout the run, which usually go off first so that they can eat all the chocolate biscuits before the rest of us arrive, to those that would prefer a more leisurely run, and then everyone in between. As I'm sure you will appreciate, not an easy task, as each week different people arrive to see what we are all about.

By doing this, we can then easily cater for all riding abilities and experience, without giving anyone the impression that we have elitist groups. If we get this wrong at the begining of the ride out, we, and more importantly you have the opportunity to adjust this at the halfway halt, so that folk that feel a bit uncomfortable with the group they are in are able to move to another group without any problem. But it takes communication on the night for us to quickly organise this.

6. With all that said, we need to continue to develop a solid system that makes it easier for all of us to enjoy the ride outs, and we have over the last couple of years tried various methods to ensure that everyone has 'fun'. We are very concenious that we attract make motorcyclists, old and young, with a large variation in both experience and rider ability. It is this large variation of ability and experience that has to be sorted just a few minutes before the riders set off, and until we try and explain the system to our valued newer members, we will invariably get things wrong until we get them right!

7. The last thing that anyone wants, as Dave put it very well, is that no one should feel uncormfortable or ride outwith their own confindence or ability levels. It's not what the GMC is about. We want to create an atmosphere that we care very much about our fellow bikers, from the new less experienced rider right through to the very experienced ones, many who are there to be able to offer encouragement and understanding to those that have less experience.

I hope, as all our other friends do, that this experience will not deter you from coming with us on Wednesday nights.

Don Jack
Chairman
GMC

Very well put Mr Chairman

Thank you very much for all your comments.

I can assure you that both myself and my wife will continue to turn out on a Wednesday evening ..as she feels it is the best way to gain the experience she needs.

If I offended anyone with any of my remarks then I appoligise as is was not my intention to do so. And as stated right at the start of the subject I had debated all day as too wether to post anything.

As I have recieved nothing but possitive comments then it has been worthwhile posting this subject

Thanks that you both will still be coming back and are willing to allow the club as a whole to sort out any early teething problems / hiccups. It has taken a few years of hard work from many committee and non-committee members to get to the stage where we can manage some impressively large groups and on the whole do it successfully. Part of that success is the willingness to listen to all points of view and then try out alternative strategies. This only falls down if you all beat me to the chocolate biscuits though!
Perhaps we need an obvious description of how we operate the mirror system close to the front page of the website?
Maybe the committee could look at a better way of communicating any difficulties/ discrepancies in the groups at the half way stage. It did appear to me our exit from Stonehaven was not as ordered as it could have been, but then I was not particularly paying attention to the other groups, only looking for the guy in my mirror!
If we can attract 37 bikes on a dark-ish evening we must be doing OK and helpful comments can only improve on this.

Hi All

Good response Don.

Firstly I must admit that I have not been out on many of the runs recently so have not been much help but I have led groups in the past and been a member for a few years so feel I understand the problems faced in all areas of the rides.

The only suggestion I have (and to a certain extent it does depend on the number of riders on the night who are confident they know the route , or at least how to get to the destination(s) if need) is to have at least one Tail-End Charlie or "Sweeper" (if only in the very last group each week , if numbers are short , as those riders in the earlier groups who become detached can/will be "collected" by the following group(s).

With regard to the "Mirror" or "Drop-Off" systems , both rely on the participants understanding their role and it appears sometimes that individuals either do not fully understand the importance of their actions or just dont care (I hope the former is more prevalent than the latter).
It can be frustrating waiting for a less confident rider to keep up but we must all try to show some empathy and ensure they do not get abandened.

Dont forget we have all been that rider , even if some of us are getting to old to want to remember !

The Drop-Off system can work well for experienced and novice riders alike in big groups as it enabled over-taking and an individual pace to be maintained (be it slow , medium or fast) rather than potentially trying to play "catch-up" with more confident riders. However it is a much harder system to explain in the short time available on Wednesday nights to new or recent members not familiar with it and therefore failed just as often as the alternative but when it worked it worked well.

Certainly I will be willing to act as a sweeper on the occasions I attend and am sure that many others would do the same so that no one person is inconvenienced too often during the season but that our newer members feel "looked after" and enjoy their ride and reach their destination in safety.

Ride Safe and have fun

Bit of a mixup on Wednesday.
I was the leader of the last group and I very much regret if someone's evening was spoiled.
I didn't know who was in the group or how many or what experience they had.
Suddenly it was time to go. I wrongly thought that our vice chairman/marshall
was in this last group and was "sweeper".
Two occasions I stopped to re-muster--2 minutes the first time and about 4 minutes the second time when it was thought that the missing 4 had over-shot and headed
towards Banchory.At all times I kept the speed to that of the 2nd and 3rd bikes..
The last words that our "marshall" reminded us were,"keep the guy behind you in your mirror".
Oldmansteve you didn't say which group you were in, hope you'll give it another try! - ---but I've been in the same position--maybe a bit slow in corners,etc.
Some of you will say that I'm STILL slow in corners. Well I know that!
We'll get the mirror system perfected for next Wednesday.

oldmansteve wrote:

Thank you very much for all your comments.

I can assure you that both myself and my wife will continue to turn out on a Wednesday evening ..as she feels it is the best way to gain the experience she needs.

If I offended anyone with any of my remarks then I appoligise as is was not my intention to do so. And as stated right at the start of the subject I had debated all day as too wether to post anything.

As I have recieved nothing but possitive comments then it has been worthwhile posting this subject

Great news and I look forward to seeing you both on Wednesday night

Dave

Its good to see so many members keen to sort out the mirror system - or at least ensure all riders in the groups remember that they need to keep the person behind them in sight - no matter how frustrating or difficult that may be. We have frequently shortened the run in the slower groups to ensure a timely arrival at the Red Star (and the chance of a chocciy biscuit!) in the past.

However, like Dave, I am appalled that anyone would suggest that your wife needs to ride faster than she is comfortable with. I'd like to know who spouted such ill considered rubbish to an inexperienced rider.

I am glad you will be riding with us again and I am sure you will have a better experience in the weeks ahead.

Col wrote:

However, like Dave, I am appalled that anyone would suggest that your wife needs to ride faster than she is comfortable with. I'd like to know who spouted such ill considered rubbish to an inexperienced rider.

.

I would be surprised if the member concerned meant that she put her self in danger. I see no point in
trying to find out who it was that said it. As there is always two sides to a story.
(Probably thought why are you in a fast group when you are not experienced to do the legal limit)
When it is a matter that the people in the groups got mixed up in error.

The main thing in this was that new members felt the run did not go the way they expected and i am sure by the above comments,that the committe and members will now address the problems that occured.

Glad to see all points being brought up .Could easily have been two members lost with no one knowing why.

[
When my wife got back to the Red Star..She was promptly told that she needs to ride faster and that if the limit is 60 then she should be doing that.

This was for both of us our First Run Out and only about the 3rd time my wife had been on her Bike since she past her test.

And although she would welcome any constuctive critisism about her riding. She does not feel that she should be forced to do a speed that she does not feel comfortable with.

We are both quite new to bikes and felt these rides would give us some valuable experience, and not Knock our confidence.

I look forward to any comments.

have to disagree with the comment of if its a 60 then do it ?? should always ride within your own comfort zone and if its less than 60 so what its not race

hi oldmansteve , sorry i havent read through everyones reply to what you said, i was just going to say, that after passing my test just over a year ago i wasnt riding aswell as other people i was out with (not from this site )who had lots more experience, so my partner booked me some time with keith henderson from this site (does advanced riding ) , and it really made a difference not that it made me faster just smoother at lots of things i used to think twice about , and just by being smoother and more relaxed , i found that i enjoyed my bike a lot more ........ not saying that there is anything wrong with the way your wife or yourself rides , just trying to say thats how i felt .. sort of out of my depth ,(hope that sounds right) ,, and struggling to see the fun part as it felt like hard work ,,,, but after just a small amoumt of time with keith i feel it made me more relaxed and able to enjoy my riding more ,hope you get this sorted so u can relax and enjoy .kaz

just read that back to mysel and sounds like im saying you are slow ..sorry that was not what i intended to say or implied ,, i just wanted to say i know how it feels not to see the fun as u feel "under pressure " and just wanted to say how much a little after test training helped me , the stuff you dont learn during your "test training" all the best and might see you later in the year as i have just started building my confidence back up after being off the road during the winter