I know a few months ago I shared my critique of the current load of roadie bloggers who think part of their “culture” is fetishizing rules on clothing and equipment. While I see these rules as a reflection of the writers’ personal insecurities, they are off putting and do not serve us well.

So at risk of being a rule obsessed roadie, I have to share two rules I think everyone should follow while road riding in response to this video I recently discovered. We could call them best practices, but then you might ignore me and end up like this guy:

It appears this ride ended up fairly unscathed, but you might not be so lucky. I have logged tens of thousands of miles in group rides, and this could have been prevented. Please follow these rules to avoid his fate.

Rule #1: Aero bars are verboten in pace lines.

This rider’s biggest problem is he is tucked in his aero bars at the back of his pace line. Not only does that mean he has no ability to slow down his bike, but the aero bars are completely unnecessary! The whole idea of a pace line is to draft on the guy in front of you. Your aero bars are providing you no benefit while your crash is becoming a “when”, not “if.”

If you are going on a group ride, leave the tri bike at home. If your road bike has aero bars, stay out of them unless you are taking a pull at the front or when you get dropped.

Sitting in your aero bars in a pace line is dangerous to the people around you and does not help you. Don’t do it!

Rule #2: 32 spoke, triple cross wheels rule.

When you are training, save the low spoke count wheels for races. This guy should not have overlapped the rear wheel of the guy in front of him, but when he did and got hit, the reason he lost control is that one of the spokes on his ridiculously low spoke count wheel snapped causing a catastrophic failure of the wheel.

Low spoke count wheels look cool and sometimes save weight (though many times not … often the manufacturer has to beef up the rim to take the high tension this wheel build requires negating much if not all the weight savings of the fewer spokes.) Unfortunately, they have little to no redundancy. I have experienced a low count, radial built wheel completely fail with a single broken spoke.

Fortunately, there is a tried and (will stay) true option that has won countless Tours de France: the 32 spoke, triple cross wheel. This wheel build that took Coppi and Merckx to victory is incredibly strong and with the right materials, like light weight box rims and butted spokes, is relatively light. Most importantly, they have a TON of redundancy. Due to the number of spokes and how they are crossed, a single broken spoke is no problem. Even three or four broken spokes are not necessarily catastrophic and with a spoke wrench can still get you home in a pinch.

With wheels, tension is the most important factor for the overall strength of the wheel, both enough and that it is even. I have a strong preference for hand built wheels as you know the tension will be right (plus I really enjoy building my own wheels.) Machine built wheels are pretty good these days too, though you do not get to choose your wheel parts which often leads to the 32 spoke variety being heavier than they need to be for economy.

Now before you say I am not being “Pro” or whatever phrase you want to use to describe roadie orthodoxy, take a look at what most pros ride on training rides. More often than not it is 32 spoke, triple cross wheels. They are dependable and pretty cheap even for the nicest pair… perfect for the abuse on long miles. Many pros choose this type of wheel for training because it makes senses.

This is why I am wary of the guy who shows up to a training ride on his Zip 404s. He is broadcasting to me he does not have the experience to know you save those wheels for race day or pre-race tune up rides. This is not someone I am going to feel comfortable jumping into a pace line with because he may just do what the guy in this video did.

So there. I broke my own rule by making some rules. The only difference is these rules are not about making me feel better than you but hopefully making that next group ride a better experience for everyone.