Planning a Club Group Ride Route

Planning a club group ride route means choosing a distance, roads, climbs and stops that the slowest rider you expect can manage, then publishing a finish time everyone can plan around. A solo route needs none of that, which is why a lane you love can go wrong with a group:

You know the lane. Hedges either side, barely a car all morning, a lovely descent into the next village. You've ridden it alone a hundred times. Then you put it on the club route. Twelve riders meet a tractor on a blind bend, the descent ends at a give-way with gravel down the middle, and the group arrives in the village in three pieces with the sweep nowhere in sight.

Planning a route for yourself and planning one for a group are different jobs. Solo, you plan for the riding. For a group, you plan for the moments when the group is under stress: junctions, climbs, descents, traffic, and the slowest rider's legs at km 50. Here's how to build a club route that holds together.

Start from the riders, not the map

The most common route mistake happens before you open a mapping tool: planning the ride you'd like to do instead of the ride the group can do. Decide who it's for first. Which pace group? How mixed? Any newcomers? The distance follows from those answers.

Example ride lengths by pace group (the planning ranges this series uses, not a standard). For a first ride, a mixed group or the winter months, plan at the bottom of the range.

Pace group	Ride length (km)
D: social / no-drop	25–40 km
C: endurance	40–70 km
B: tempo	60–100 km
A: fast	80–140 km

When in doubt, go shorter. A ride that finishes with people wanting more brings them back next week. A ride that finishes with someone limping home on empty legs doesn't, however pretty the route was.

The usable rule: pick the group, then pick a distance from the bottom half of its range. You can always add a loop for the riders who want extra.

Do the time arithmetic, then publish a finish time

Riders plan their day around when they'll be home, not around kilometres. "60 km" means nothing to someone who has to collect a child at 1 p.m. "Back by 12:30" means everything.

Cycling UK's Ride Leader Standards Handbook (version 3, March 2026) gives the same advice as a planning tip: "To encourage less confident riders, talk about your ride in terms of time taken, rather than distance." It also asks a question worth putting to every draft: "Would a ride of 50km be suitable for a beginner's ride?"

Moving time for a 60 km route at different average speeds. Simple arithmetic (distance ÷ speed), before any stops.

Average moving speed	Moving time (min)
18 km/h	200 min
22 km/h	164 min
25 km/h	144 min
28 km/h	129 min
32 km/h	113 min

Then add the stops, which is where most estimates go wrong. These are the allowances we plan with, not measured averages:

• Café: 30 to 45 minutes for a group. Twelve riders ordering, eating and queueing for one toilet takes time.
• Regroups: a few minutes each, including the minute you give the last rider to recover.
• A puncture: allow around 10 minutes, more in the cold or with a stubborn tyre.
• Climbing: your published pace band is a flat-to-rolling speed. A hilly route lowers the average, so plan with a slower number.

Worked example: a 60 km C ride at 24 km/h average is 2 h 30 of moving time. Add 40 minutes at the café and 15 minutes for regroups and a puncture, and you're at about 3 h 25. Start at 9:00, publish "back around 12:30". Riders can plan around that, and you have a little slack for a bad day.

Pick roads that suit a bunch

A road that's fine for one rider can be wrong for twelve. A group needs room, sightlines, low traffic speeds and as few junctions as possible where it has to give way across traffic.

Road features for group rides: what to look for and what to avoid

Road feature	For a group	Why
Quiet secondary roads with room to be overtaken	Build the route on these	Drivers can pass safely, the group can ride steadily
Busy main roads, dual carriageways	Avoid	Fast traffic and long groups don't mix
Large multi-lane roundabouts	Avoid or reroute	Groups split at roundabouts and the back gets caught out
Turns across fast traffic (right in the UK, left on the Continent)	Keep to a minimum	A group takes a long time to cross; one car splits it
Single-track lanes with blind bends	Short sections only	No room to pass oncoming traffic with a group
Tram tracks, cattle grids, level crossings	Brief them beforehand	Cross at a right angle, one at a time if needed
Gravel or broken surfaces	Only if advertised	Punctures and nervous riders
Town centres	Start and finish only	Lights and traffic split the group over and over

Rules on riding two abreast differ between countries, and they decide how much road a group of twelve takes up. This is what the four national codes our readers ride under said when we read them on 14 October 2026:

Riding two abreast: what the national rules say (read on 14 October 2026; check the current text before you brief)

Country	Rule	What it means for your route
UK	Highway Code, rule 66: you can ride two abreast and it can be safer, particularly in larger groups; let drivers overtake, for example by moving into single file or stopping, when you feel it is safe	Choose roads with places where the group can single out or pull in
France	Code de la route, art. R431-7: never more than two abreast; single file at nightfall and whenever traffic requires it, notably when a vehicle wanting to overtake signals its approach	Long, narrow, busy roads mean long stretches in single file; keep them off big-group routes
Spain	Reglamento General de Circulación, art. 36.2: two abreast on the shoulder, or on the minimum necessary part of the carriageway if there is no usable shoulder; single file where visibility is poor, when you hold up traffic, and between sunset and sunrise	Mark the blind bends and crests where the group must single out
Italy	Codice della strada, art. 182: never more than two abreast, and always single file outside built-up areas unless one rider is under ten and rides on the other's right	Outside towns, twelve riders make one long line: split big groups and leave room between them

Group size matters as much. Cycling UK's handbook recommends splitting groups of more than 15 where possible, and advises against riding two abreast with poor visibility ahead or on roads with "particularly fast-moving traffic". This is general information, not legal advice: brief the rules that apply where you ride, and check your federation's guidance.

The usable trick: choose the direction of the loop so that most turns go with the traffic, not across it. On the same roads, the two directions rarely have the same number of turns across traffic: count them on the map and ride the direction with fewer.

Place climbs and descents with the group in mind

Climbs split groups; that's physics, not a failure. Your job is to put them where the split is easy to manage. One quick comparison: divide total climbing by distance. There's no official scale for this, so use it to compare routes, not to rate them: 400 m over 60 km is under 7 m per km, while 1,200 m over the same 60 km is 20 m per km, three times the climbing for the same distance and many more splits in a mixed group.

• Not in the first 15 minutes. Cold legs and a hard climb straight out of the car park is how you lose someone before the ride has started. Give it 20 to 30 minutes of easy roads first.
• A regroup spot at the top of every real climb. Find it on the map or street view before the ride: off the road, with room for the whole group, not on a bend.
• Be careful with descents that end in trouble. A fast descent into a junction, a village street or a sharp bend is a bad combination for a group. Reroute, or call it in the briefing and at the top.
• No regroups on descents. Everyone descends at their own pace and the group comes back together at the bottom, somewhere safe.
• Something easy after the café. Full stomachs and cooled-down legs don't love a climb straight away.
• An easy last 5 km. Don't finish on a big climb or a fast run into town. The end of the ride is when people are tired and least careful.

Climbing also changes how far people can ride. The same 60 km feels very different at 400 m of climbing and at 1,200 m. Put both numbers in the listing.

Regroup points, the café and the practical stops

Regroups are part of the route, not something the leader improvises. Mark them on your plan.

• Where: tops of climbs, after junctions where traffic can split you, and, as our own rule of thumb rather than a standard, every 10 to 15 km on a mixed ride even if it's flat. Long flat stretches hide gaps until they're big.
• What makes a good spot: off the carriageway, room for the whole group, visible to traffic from both directions, and not on a bend or just after a junction.
• The café: roughly halfway to 60% of the distance. Too early and riders aren't hungry yet; too late and someone is already running on empty. Pick one that can cope with ten or more cyclists, and call ahead if your group is big.
• Water and toilets: on longer or summer rides, know where riders can refill bottles. Cemeteries, cafés and village fountains are classics; check they're actually usable.

Food timing matters as much as the café's location. Riders who don't eat in the first hour often fade before the stop. A word on that in the briefing goes a long way, and how to fuel a long bike ride has the numbers.

Bail-outs and plan B

Every route needs a way to get shorter. Punctures you can't fix, a rider having a bad day, rain arriving early: none of these should leave you 30 km from the start with no option.

• Mark two or three bail-outs. Points where the route passes close to the start, a shortcut home, or a train station.
• Loop shapes help. A figure-of-eight or a cloverleaf around the start gives you natural cut points.
• Have a wet-weather version. Shorter, fewer technical descents, fewer lanes covered in mud and leaves. Decide the night before which version you're riding.
• Use the wind. When you can, ride the first half into the wind and come home with it behind you. Tired riders and a headwind home is how no-drop rides fall apart. More on that promise in what a no-drop ride really means.

Name the bail-outs in the briefing. A rider who knows there's a shortcut at km 25 is more likely to take it in time, before they're cooked.

Recon, then share the route properly

A route you haven't checked is a guess. Ride it if you can. If you can't, go through every junction, regroup spot and descent on street view, and check for roadworks and road closures with the local authority's listings.

Then share it so every rider has what they need:

• One GPX file and one link, sent a day or two before. Don't edit it the morning of the ride; half the group will have the old version.
• The key numbers: distance, climbing, start time, finish time, café at km X, regroup points.
• A short cue list of the tricky junctions, for riders without a GPS head unit.
• Leader and sweep both carry the route. If the group splits, the back half can still navigate.
• Someone off the ride knows the plan. Cycling UK's handbook says to "always inform someone not on the ride of your route, intended stopping points and expected timings." Your published finish time turns that into a one-line message.

The leader's side of ride day, from the briefing to the regroups, is in how to be a good ride leader.

The route-planning checklist

Run your draft route through this before you publish it.

Club route checklist: questions to answer before publishing

Item	Question to answer
Riders	Which pace group is it for, and is the distance in the bottom half of its range?
Time	Moving time plus café, regroups and one puncture: when will you realistically be back?
Roads	Have you avoided busy main roads, big roundabouts and most turns across traffic?
First climb	Does it come after at least 20 minutes of easy riding?
Descents	Does any fast descent end at a junction, a village or a sharp bend?
Regroups	Is there a safe spot at the top of every climb and at least every 10 to 15 km?
Café	Open that day, around halfway, able to take the group?
Bail-outs	Two or three ways to cut the ride short, and a wet-weather version?
Wind	Can you ride out into the wind and home with it behind you?
Recon	Every junction checked, roadworks checked, GPX shared once?

Ten questions, fifteen minutes. If you're setting up the whole ride (group size, pace bands, timeline), the playbook for running your first club group ride covers the rest, and group ride etiquette and calls is worth sending to newer riders with the route.

FAQ

How long should a club group ride be?

It depends on the pace group. As a guide, social rides run about 25 to 40 km, endurance rides 40 to 70 km, and faster groups longer. For a first ride or a mixed group, plan at the bottom of the range.

How do you plan a cycling club route?

Start from the riders and pick a distance, work out the finish time including stops, build the route on quiet roads that suit a group, place climbs and regroup points carefully, choose a café around halfway, add bail-outs, then check the route before sharing one GPX file.

How many regroup points should a club ride have?

One at the top of every climb long enough to split the group, one after any junction where traffic can cut you in two, and at least every 10 to 15 km on a mixed ride, even on flat roads.

Where should the café stop go on a club ride?

Around halfway to 60% of the distance, at a café that's open that day and can take a group. Too early and riders aren't hungry; too late and some will already be running on empty.

Should a club route avoid main roads?

As much as possible. Quiet secondary roads with room for drivers to overtake suit a group far better. When a short busy section can't be avoided, brief it beforehand and keep it as short as you can.

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How we made this. Written by club riders who plan and lead weekly club routes, with AI help for drafting and translation. The moving-time chart and the worked example are plain arithmetic (distance ÷ speed, plus the stop allowances we plan with); the ride-length ranges are the planning ranges this series uses, not a standard. The road rules were read on 14 October 2026 in the UK Highway Code, the French Code de la route, Spain's Reglamento General de Circulación and Italy's Codice della strada; the Cycling UK quotes come from its Ride Leader Standards Handbook (version 3, March 2026). General guidance, not legal advice: rules change, so check the current text, your national federation and your club's insurer.