RideLondon safety car WON'T set 22mph speed limit — organisers admit race guide was "incorrect"

"It will travel at a pace determined by the conditions and what is happening on the road"...

So the driver will evaluate on the fly what pace he deems acceptable ? A car drivers perspective of a safe pace is very different to that of a group of pace line riders working hard.

Personally I'd ask for a refund on the basis that the pace of the ride is now going to be determined by a car driver and that the terms of sale did not explicitly state that at the time of sale.

Alternatively just filter undertake the car ....

ha ha ha aha haha haaamdlsanfharw 9t'v jgkn.......

this is what a professional organisation does when looking after 20,000 riders and similar numbers of spectators on one of the biggest events in the calendar..any other typos, or errors in the guidance we think they made??

maybe they forgot they were doing bag transfers too...

maybe they forgot to add the page with the map about tower bridge finsih and logistics ...

..so very 2010's 

gravel sportif is where it's at 😉

Update incoming, sound like sense has prevailed and it was just an error in the guide book....  the car will travel at a pace determined by the conditions and what is happening on the road, but you still arent allowed to overtake it

I saw a premonition of what may happen on one a few years back.  

Quite a few waves back, 20 miles in, chap on his own on a mountain bike decides he needs to use the toilets on the right and moves over towards them. 

A chain of about 10-15 riders then fly through the decreasing gap at 25mph+

Really close to a very nasty crash.   Can see that happening throughout the ride.

To put it bluntly: the very fastest riders will be doing from between 8 - 130mph less than is normal for Essex roads. 
 

Nice.

The whole "As is customary at major sportives" falls flat on it's face when you then cite the 22mph limit. I've worked in major sportives and I've also been a lead car driver for some. We are normally told to go at the pace of the leading riders, keep them in sight, but don't let them draft.

So as an example, if you are going up a climb, you can whizz on to the top and as the leading riders hit about 3/4 of the way up, you start on the descent, because you know they are going to be faster than you, once at the bottom, regulate your speed until they are in sight again and carry on. I normally try for around 100/150m in front depending on the route. 

It's the same being the broom wagon, never be right up the last riders arse. If you see them up ahead, that's good, if you get too close, just stop and have a 5 minute break. 

The ONLY way they could possibly make this work is by having a lead car with every single wave, limited to 22mph. Otherwise, as I've already seen, people are changing their waves back to a later start time and they'll be linking up with faster riders and still going round in fast times, just at the danger to everyone else who's on a leisurely ride (maybe charity riders in a slower group).

I notice you haven't covered other things in this report though. There appears to be no bag drop this year. Previously, your bag would be loaded and transported to the finishing area, which also seems to have been done away with. So unless you have someone meeting you at the finish, you've got to figure out logistics to get home in full kit.

That tweet from Mark Oliver kind of sums it up IMO:

Mark Oliver wrote:

Just to check this. You are running a closed road cycle event, where the speed limit on cyclists is slower than the speed limit on days when roads aren't closed. For 'their' safety....

They need to properly address for whom they are making it a safety call, because for the majority of riders who wont be used to riding in big groups with much stronger riders passing them repeatedly, it will create more problems and likely far more crashes than if they just let the faster riders pace off the front.

They wont of course as I think for a while runners who've dealt with London Marathon Events as an organisation have rarely had any good words to say about them.

And I suspect this is really part of some time management for road closures, to alleviate all the complications for access on closed road course.

Its wierd.  Was there a 22mph "safety car" on the Surrey routes? 

If not whats changed?  Same organiser (LME) to my knowledge. 

I wonder if it Essex Councils/Rozzers - possibly linked to 'elf and safety.

I guess technically as long as the safety car sets off early enough not even a fast rider will catch it.