2025 Pointless Prize: #GroupRideGuru & #GroupRideGroupie

[drevil]

EDITED 1/29/25 – After 1 group ride, I realized I made the rules waaaay too difficult, so I’m simplifying this game as much as I can.

1. If you join a Freezing Saddles Group ride, just tag your ride with #groupridegroupie. (Scoreboard)
2. If you organize a Freezing Saddles Group ride and let people know about it at least the day before, tag the ride in Strava with #grouprideguru. (Scoreboard)
3. If you want to go for the #GroupRideGiganticus prize, please post a pic in this thread with as many people in the pic as you can. You don’t have to be the one to have taken the pic, but it should be posted here before the end of 2025 Freezing Saddles. At the end of Freezing Saddles, I’ll just count the people in your pic and the ride leader who has the pic with the most riders wins #GroupRideGiganticus 🙂

Thank you to those that already played and put pics in this thread. It’s no longer necessary because we’ll be using the scoreboards for this, but it is great to see folks getting out there to meet others for the group rides. Feel free to continue doing so if you’d like, but please remember to tag those group rides appropriately in Strava!

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EDITED 1/10/25 – Changed it from 5 people to 3 people minimum, so that means at least 2 riders and the organizer have to be on the ride (and pictured) for it to count.

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I love Freezing Saddles group rides, so to encourage them, I’m setting up the #GroupRideGuru and #GroupRideGroupie Pointless Prize.

What are they?

#GroupRideGuru The person that organizes and leads the most amount of Freezing Saddles group rides

#GroupRideGroupie The person that joins the most group rides

So what group rides count for this pointless prize?

1. It has to be organized and led by a Freezing Saddles rider
2. The group ride has to be open and accessible to all Freezing Saddles participants
3. The ride has to be posted in the Freezing Saddles section of this forum at least 48 hours the day before the ride happens
4. The ride has to be at least 10 miles long
5. At least 5 3 people (including yourself) have to be on the ride (EDITED 1/10/25 to change from 5 people to 3 minimum)

 

How do I prove that I led or joined a group ride? (SEE EDIT ON 1/29 AT THE TOP OF THIS THREAD)

1. Each ride participant that wants credit will need to post 1 (and only one) picture from the ride in this thread, along with some text:
   1. Lead with: #GroupRideGuru if you organized and led the ride OR #GroupRideGroupie if you joined the ride
   2. The date of the ride
2. The picture must have at least 5 3 participants in it. Include yourself by taking a selfie/ussie if you need to meet that minimum, but you don’t have to be in it if there are at least 5 3 participants already in the pic
3. A different picture than what’s already posted in the thread (to avoid 5 3 people on the ride posting the same pic). That said, you don’t have to be the person that took the pic
4. Do this within 48 hours of the ride (to avoid last-minute swoop-ins and to keep things moving)

 

Keep in mind that this prize is tallied by the pics that you post in this thread, not by hashtags, or just joining the rides. You have to post that group ride pic here for it to count in this pointless prize! 🙂

Scoreboard: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1R5hvQjjFoTcY2mpvUN7IDUj4y5vwtYTmzmZU_CHXXWU

FAQS:

1. Do all the riders have to be Freezing Saddles participants?
   1. Nope. Just follow the rules above and it’ll count.
2. Does it have to be a Freezing Saddles group ride?
   1. Yup. The point of this prize is to bring together Freeing Saddles participants, so just joining a random non-FS ride doesn’t follow the spirit.

Topic

[drevil]

There’ll be a third prize for the Guru that organizes/leads the biggest group ride #GroupRideGiganticus

We’ll go by how many ride participants we can distinctly count in the pictures that are posted for that ride. The Guru doesn’t even have to be the person that posts the pic, but they are of course welcome to. I just want them to be recognized for the effort they put in to round up the Freezing Saddlers and go in a direction 🙂

For example, this was a great ride that Lumberjack set up in 2018 with a lot of participants:

[Porrick]

Hey Drevil.  Looking forward to another doughnut shop ride!  If I lead a ride (and post as instructed), do all of the participants have to be FS-ers and/or friends, or can we mix in some other nuts?

[drevil]

For these group rides, I leave it up to the leader/organizer to decide whether they solely want Freezing Saddle riders and friends on their group ride, or open to everyone. It doesn’t matter for this pointless prize; I just care that the group ride is open to FS Riders and Friends.

That was a great ride, thanks for coming! (Although I’m not quite sure who you are solely by your handle, but you can let me know when we see each other, if you want :D)

I’ll definitely organize another Donut Ride for the ’25 Freezing Saddles!

[Serdar]

Come join my group ride, friends!

Jan 4 Saturday Morning Ride to Caboose in Vienna

[obscurerichard]

Thank you Serdar for organizing today’s ride – alas we had only 4 participants so technically this ride was not eligible for the prize with the rules as written.

[Serdar]

That’s fine, @obscurerichard. Our ride itself was a prize for me. 🙂

[drevil]

Hi @Serdar and @obscurerichard! Thanks for playing, and sorry I didn’t respond here. I was away for a few weeks so haven’t been checking.

Not sure if you noticed, but I changed the minimum number of participants from 5 to 3. If you post up group pics from the ride on this thread, I’ll retro-count this one since I was not attentive and trying to get a feel for what works best.

Thank you for getting the ball rolling on the group rides. I hope to start organizing some myself when I get a little less busy 🙂

[Serdar]

Thanks, @drevil. I will take your offer. Here is our group photo at the Vienna Community Center.

[Serdar]

Hi Freezing Saddlers,

You’re invited to join Team Super NoVa for a ride at Hains Point on Sunday, January 26, at 9 AM! Let’s ride as many laps as we like and connect with each other.

Friends are welcome, and you don’t have to be a Freezing Saddler to join—everyone is invited! The more, the merrier, so feel free to spread the word.

We hope to see you there!

Team Super NoVa

[Boomer Cycles]

Great idea, and I just extended this invite to my team’s #6 Strava Club so hopefully it’ll will bring more Freezing Saddles together. Thanks for organizing.

[Serdar]

Hi Boomer. Thanks for extending the invitation. I hope to see you and your team there.

[obscurerichard]

This is a picture of 2 of the 4 of us that were on this ride, does this count towards #groupridegroupie? It’s the same ride that Serdar posted as the Guru.

 

[drevil]

Donut Ride 2/1/25: details going into the following thread as they are worked out: https://www.bikearlingtonforum.com/forums/topic/group-ride-donut-ride-2-1-25/#post-1136325

Cheers,

rickyd

[Robbie Rob]

1/26/25 I was a GroupRideGroupie with Team 19 to Hains Point and did three laps.

[Serdar]

GroupRideGuru – 26/01/2025

Thanks to everyone who came for Team Super NoVa’s group ride at Hains Paint!

[Author]

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