I Host Group Cycling Rides at 'Jalopy Pace.' Here's How That Can Encourage More People to Try Biking.

6 min read

WHEN I STARTED cycling in New York City in the spring of 2023, I dove headfirst into the hobby. I watched endless YouTube videos about gear and proper training technique, read about the city’s quest to improve its cycling infrastructure, and even started following the pro peloton. Still, I was scared to actually participate in the social center of my city’s cycling community: group rides. I couldn’t shake the fear I’d be left behind in a snarl of traffic by more experienced, savvier riders.

I didn’t know it then, but time spent with my friends on the periphery of larger group rides would eventually help me come up with a label for the pace and environment that I believe anyone on two wheels can follow. I needed what I now call “Jalopy Pace.” This might sound like something a dig—a “jalopy” is an old-timey way of calling a car a junker—but it’s actually a mentality that allows for no-worries riding by committing to leaving no one behind.

Much like the popular run clubs that also bring movement and community to city streets, Jalopy Pace rides have become my way to invite people who have never felt confident enough to join a group ride to get in on the fun.

The Road to Jalopy Pace

THAT BREAKTHROUGH MOMENT took time. After following a couple of bike-related Instagram pages, I was bombarded with flyers for public group rides held by local organizations. The flyers would often feature helpful information, like a start and end location along with a chuckle-worthy graphic, but lacked other details that seemed important. What was the route? What kind of bikes would people ride? And importantly for me as a newbie: how fast would everyone be going?

When they did list paces, I was still confused. What did it mean to ride at 10 mph? Or 12? Or 15 mph? It all seemed faster than I could manage! I stayed home rather than find out the hard way I couldn’t keep up.

Eventually, I really grew to love riding with my friends. Whether we were looping around the loop in a park or riding to coffee shops in far away neighborhoods, I enjoyed how easily conversation flowed as we traversed parts of the city both familiar and new. I was also surprised how much being around other people motivated me to go just a little bit longer and push just a little bit harder.

It took one of these friends to invite me to my first large group ride (which I almost didn’t attend for lack of detail from the organizer). That day stands as one of my most cherished biking memories. My worries about speed proved to be unfounded, as our group rolled at a moderate pace that still allowed me to chat with the person next to me. We rode in the street, but not chaotically. Our leader slowed when we approached stop lights, called out double-parked vehicles blocking the lanes, and made sure everyone knew when they were about to make a turn. When we encountered a hill, the leader always stopped at its crest, waiting for the slowest rider, which I was genuinely shocked to learn was someone else. This was everything I loved about my rides with friends—plus the opportunity to make new ones. I met a few folks on that blustery Tuesday that are still some of my favorite people within my cycling community, learned about a few bike paths I had never seen before, and got to enjoy a stunning sunset.

I realized my assumptions about group outings were disastrously wrong. As a city that boasts almost as many daily bike riders as there are people in Boston, New York City also features a wide range of group rides. Just as runners can choose to join genial run clubs, where they can glide at “sexy pace,” or attend hardcore group track workouts, cyclists have plenty of options, too. There are members-only clubs who gather in the parks at the crack of dawn to ride in tight, organized pelotons, open-invite bike parties that draw big enough crowds to take over broad avenues, and gatherings of brave, mostly brakeless fixed gear riders, who fly through the narrow spaces in traffic and take stop lights as suggestions.

When I launched my newsletter, Leg Day, about city cycling and started inviting more people to ride with me, some people assumed the group would be intense. Just like I had reacted to those IG invites just a few months earlier, beginner riders told me they didn’t think they weren’t fast enough to keep up with me, and also that their bike wasn’t nice enough to participate. This latter part felt especially tough to swallow. My main ride is a beefy steel Schwinn from the 1970s, not a sleek carbon-fiber mount that costs thousands. It’s not particularly fast, but it’s sturdy; and the TLC it’s required in shops reminds me of the aging Model T in old Archie comics. Honestly, I began to think, my bike is kind of a jalopy, too.

This offered me a way to clearly communicate that cyclists with all levels of fitness, experience, and equipment would be welcome on my rides. Every group ride I would plan, I decided, would be ridden at this “Jalopy Pace.” Rather than aiming for a specific speed range, I would ask people who rode with me to embrace an accommodating, community-focused state-of-mind. Jalopy Pace is defensive, requiring stops for lights and massive obstacles. I’d also ask everyone who joined me to look out for everyone else in the bunch, and make it clear that we’d pause after any hill, so every participant felt empowered to take climbs at an effort that they believed they could maintain.

I am proud of the space Jalopy Pace has carved out within the cycling community. My rides have drawn participation from seasoned racers, who treat it as a chill break from training; experienced adventurers, who appreciate the chance to explore the city in a friendly space; and also genuine beginners, who have previously never joined a group ride. Many people have told me that the Jalopy Pace framework gave them confidence to take on ambitious challenges, like longer distances and steeper hills, just because they feel confident the group would not leave them behind.

Taking Jalopy Pace to the Streets

I COULD FULLY appreciate this last fall during the Prospect Park Half Century, an event I planned with the help of Dawn Patrol—a Thursday morning group ride for cis women, trans women and non-binary riders. We split the crowd of sixty into three waves. There was a speedy group of riders with racing experience who felt comfortable tackling the entire 50 mile distance without any breaks, a steady crew who would go a little slower but try to keep things moving, and a Jalopy pack.

During a quick round of pre-ride ice breakers, many participants in that last wave revealed they had never ridden more than a lap or two of the park at a time, or that the longest ride they had done previously was about an hour long. The plan for the day involved just under 15 laps of the park’s 3.36 mile loop, which would likely take us about four hours. I had a moment of panic. Was my plan actually going to just cook everyone to oblivion?

I spent the first 10 laps at the front of the bunch, trying to keep the pace steady enough that conversations could flow between everyone who was behind me. At each of our planned stops, I tried to check in with participants without making it clear how nervous I was the group would finish. And as we crossed 40 miles, I decided to fall to the back to give someone else the chance to lead the group home. I prepared myself to see the stony faces of depleted riders. Instead, it was all smiles.

When my group completed the 15th lap a few minutes later, we gathered at the sculpture in the median near the park’s north entrance. It was clear everyone was tired, but no one looked so exhausted they couldn’t stand. Though many people had just biked further than they ever had before, no one had buried themselves to do so.

The whole thing about cycling (and any hobby, really) is that there are as many ways to engage with it as there are people participating in it. And ultimately, no matter how you ride bikes, you’re probably doing it because you like doing it. Finding a way to bring more people into the fold to discover their own way to love cycling will always be more important to me than going as fast as I can—so as long as I’m planning group rides, I’ll be going at Jalopy Pace.