Am I Being Unreasonable? MTB Court now in session!

20 mins is nothing.

But it is if I have something to get back to. It means my ride will have to be 1:40 and not 2 hours. So less riding, less of the good stuff. It means 1/6 of the riding time is spent in a car park waiting.

This is what the late people don’t seem to get. Like TJ says, if it’s 7pm meet for a 7:30 start that’s fine. I’ll be there, ready to ride at 7:30pm.

Ride starts at 7 then it starts at 7. If James is only there for the social aspect he can see Dave in the pub at the end!

20 mins is nothing.

In which case the serially late people should have no issue in sorting themselves out to save that 20 mins and get there on time.

5-10 mins is ok if it’s mates and not the same person being late all the time. That said it seems to be a cycling thing as when it 5 aside kick off at 7pm everyone is on the pitch at 7pm and no one is ever late or faffing with boots etc delaying you.

Where we my actual friends value my time enough to be on time. And know that if they’re not they won’t complain that I don’t wait.
And don’t you catchup on the ride?

I’m rarely late, but I just wouldn’t be that bothered if my mates turned up a bit late, and I know they wouldn’t be bothered if I was a bit late.

I don’t do a regular ride meet up like some people seem to do so I mabye think about this differently than others. But this:

That said it seems to be a cycling thing as when it 5 aside kick off at 7pm everyone is on the pitch at 7pm and no one is ever late or faffing with boots etc delaying you.

Theres a start time for somehing when you book a court or something and have paid for a time slot. Going for a ride is just that. A 2 hour ride is a 2 hour ride what ever time it starts. If you’re really that pushed for time to get somewhere afterwards, should you really be scheduling the ride to finish with no wriggle room for getting to your important thing?

But it is if I have something to get back to. It means my ride will have to be 1:40 and not 2 hours. So less riding, less of the good stuff. It means 1/6 of the riding time is spent in a car park waiting.

This is what the late people don’t seem to get. Like TJ says, if it’s 7pm meet for a 7:30 start that’s fine. I’ll be there, ready to ride at 7:30pm.

It means either EVERYONE else who turned up on time will only get 1:40 .. and it also means any planned route might need to be replanned so noone does the planned route.

If someone has to leave at a firm time it means either splitting the ride or them potentially being late.

All because someone can’t be arsed to do as they said they were going to do.

Tricky one. Small group of friends and it isn’t always one person being late live with it. Big group where the late person is holding up 15 people,  start without him.

Used to work somewhere where staff were regularly kept late because the guy taking over was always late. Just 5 minutes but that was 5 minutes he was stealing from someone else. And guy lived 10 minutes walk away.

Theres a start time for somehing when you book a court or something and have paid for a time slot.

In other words – that time has a clear value. Thinking that this does not apply to when it’s “only mates” you’re delaying implies that other peoples time does not have value.

should you really be scheduling the ride to finish with no wriggle room for getting to your important thing?

This implies that it is up to the people who are on time for things to accept being made late due to other showing up late, hence either getting to their “next thing” late, or building in slack to accommodate it. For those who are time-poor (working people with families which is a lot of us) this means we need to either impact family more, or shrink our ride time to allow for this.

Either way, both of those point above are versions of “my time is more important than yours”.

I think I’m leaning towards “life happens sometimes, it’s mostly a social thing rather than 2 hours in zone two” more than most of the room.

Repeat offenders, though are a problem. Working along from “a word”, telling them an earlier meeting time to riding off without them a couple of times should deal with most of them.

However I’d have thought that a key skill of ride leader / route picker is the ability to come up with a 10/20/30 minute “warm up loop” to get the rest of the group from getting cold / pissed off, picking up the latecomer at or near the start? Yes, the rest of the route might need tweaking to still finish on time, but it seems a lot better than having 19 people standing around a cold car park grumbling.

Theres a start time for somehing when you book a court or something and have paid for a time slot. Going for a ride is just that. A 2 hour ride is a 2 hour ride what ever time it starts. If you’re really that pushed for time to get somewhere afterwards, should you really be scheduling the ride to finish with no wriggle room for getting to your important thing?

It’s a red herring though. If people can be organized enough to get to work on time, get to a 5-a-side on time, etc. Then they can get to the start of a ride on time. Why does it matter whether it’s making your mate wait in the car park or losing your slot at the astro pitch?

Maybe they have left enough time, maybe they’re organized enough that they know what time they will finish the ride, and won’t be leaving the next person waiting.

That and I think we’re talking about the difference between someone being 5-minutes behind when someone says “11am at the M6 Toll services for the annual Lakes Trip”, that’s excusable. Vs the kind of people who are consistently late for the 9am ride at the local trails, or the Monday night pub ride*.

If James is only there for the social aspect he can see Dave in the pub at the end!

If he’s sociable, why isn’t he there for the “meet at 7:00 for 7:15 rolling” bit, he’s not being social, he’s making his mate stand around in a car park on his own, that’s not ‘social’. Or if it is in his mind it’s back to the selfish argument, valuing your own experience ahead of everyone else. The person waiting blocked out that time for being social and riding too. If they wanted a half hour later start time they could have spent half an hour with their family / other friends / dog / cup of tea/internet smut rather than getting there for the agreed earlier time.

*other pub rides exist, I’ve no idea how punctual Binners is.

Either way, both of those point above are versions of “my time is more important than yours”.

Not at all, if I know someone has to be somewhere I will do my best to avoid making them late. I just think if you need to be somewhere you should arrange things so you’re not likely to be late. If everyone turns up on time and the ride starts on time, someone could have a mechanical that means the ride finishes 30 mins late, and you end up late for your thing. If the ride ends on time and you set off, there could be a traffic accident that means you end up late for your thing. You really need to arrange your things with more space between them.

Dont get me wrong if one person is always late and clearly doesn’t GAS about anyone else, then they are clearly not a friend and I wouldnt be riding with them anyway. I’m just clearly not that bothered about biking that I have to fit in a 2 hour ride every wednesday between work and putting the kids to bed. But a social ride should be social IMO, more a laugh than training. YMMV or something like that.

Anyway I’m going on holiday later and trying not to stress about getting to the channel tunnel on time…..

Anyway I’m going on holiday later and trying not to stress about getting to the channel tunnel on time…..

Meh, don’t worry I’m sure the other passengers won’t mind waiting around for a bit 😉

I think the operative word here is ‘Group’ I’m as frustrated by other people not valuing my time when they waste it by being late/disorganised, but then that goes with the territory on a group ride (even more so with MTBers IME).
It’s seldom intentional, ultimately you need to adjust expectations when riding with a bunch Vs riding solo, there will be Faff.

Plus of course Karma is a bitch, and one day you might be running just a few minutes late, I bet you’d appreciate people waiting a little longer for you to get your shit in a sock then…

Im all for the fiends waiting thing and i think that the informal setup works well. You can set off late (especially if its an away day and someone is stuck in traffic etc)

However the thing is this gets worse. You set the start time for 7:30 and the guy wont turn up till 7:45. it just goes on and on.

OTP is otp. if they cant make it in time they can catchup.

Faffing at the start is unforgivable. Anyone who rocks up and hasn’t tried to sort their bike out shouldn’t be rocking up. It shows maximum disrespect for everyone else.

If it falls apart while out thats fine.

Not at all, if I know someone has to be somewhere I will do my best to avoid making them late. I just think if you need to be somewhere you should arrange things so you’re not likely to be late. If everyone turns up on time and the ride starts on time, someone could have a mechanical that means the ride finishes 30 mins late, and you end up late for your thing. If the ride ends on time and you set off, there could be a traffic accident that means you end up late for your thing. You really need to arrange your things with more space between them.

Yes, but there’s a difference between a 30min cushion between activities which is built in to accommodate the unexpected (if there’s a major mechanical, crash, AND there’s traffic then that’s a statistical edge case that’ll never be possible to avoid entirely). And those people (they know who they are) who will use up YOUR 30min buffer hitting snooze and being disorganized which means you’re now very likely to be late as the odds of a mechanical OR a traffic jam are substantially higher than a mechanical AND a traffic jam.

But a social ride should be social IMO, more a laugh than training. YMMV or something like that.

“training” can be solo, for social riding people need to actually turn up and be social! Why is being late being conflated with social, it’s the very definition of anti social.

I used to ride with a group a couple of nights a week after work, it got to the point where a few people were so regularly late and renowned for riding at a ‘social’ pace and faffing that the posted two hour ride sometimes struggled to make it 8 miles. A few of us started meeting an hour early, going for a ride, then swinging by the start point at the actual start time (15 minutes after the published time) knowing full well the usual suspects would still have 10 minutes of faff to complete. The alternative was the ride ceasing to be worthwhile for the rest of us.

Meh, don’t worry I’m sure the other passengers won’t mind waiting around for a bit 😉

😂

cookeaa

I think the operative word here is ‘Group’ I’m as frustrated by other people not valuing my time when they waste it by being late/disorganised, but then that goes with the territory on a group ride (even more so with MTBers IME).
It’s seldom intentional, ultimately you need to adjust expectations when riding with a bunch Vs riding solo, there will be Faff.

Plus of course Karma is a bitch, and one day you might be running just a few minutes late, I bet you’d appreciate people waiting a little longer for you to get your shit in a sock then…

What do you mean by intentional?
Not leaving on time knowing full well is still intentional. Having a puncture isn’t…

We have a separate “Ride Planning Thread” the idea being you can quickly tell who’s going and should the unintended happen you can post to that thread and let people know…

The ones who are habitually late refuse to either use the planning thread at all or spam it to mess it up for everyone else so we don’t even know if they bothered to leave or not let alone if they are going to be late.
We used to wait 1/2 hour before giving up then next ride they would just say “oh I changed my mind”

A 2 hour ride is a 2 hour ride what ever time it starts. If you’re really that pushed for time to get somewhere afterwards, should you really be scheduling the ride to finish with no wriggle room for getting to your important thing?

I remember a ride up on the edge of the Brecon Beacons about 20 odd years ago. A bunch of us set off as normal, but one of the boys had a puncture on the first, very long climb. No real faff, just a tube change. We carried on over the ridge and back to the road, having ridden maybe a third of the route, when D rode off towards the cars, in a huff, because the delay meant that he’d be late getting home and doing stuff with his family. This is a 30+ miler through the mountains. It takes several hours and even now I wouldn’t be  setting a time limit to be back at home because things happen. There’s a stream crossing about 2/3rds way through which has been known to be un-crossable after heavy rain and means a long diversion. D had ridden about an hour of the route, meaning he’d be out of the house for a couple of hours. He always a bit odd though, normally in a good way. 😀

Plus of course Karma is a bitch, and one day you might be running just a few minutes late,

There is a difference between “one day” and “every week without fail”.
Occasionally waiting a bit longer since someone is unexpected late isnt the same as having the start time effectively moved later as standard.
My sisters ex BIL was always reliably late to meet ups. It got to the point of lying about it being an hour earlier to get them to turn up only ten mins late or so.

What do you mean by intentional?
Not leaving on time knowing full well is still intentional. Having a puncture isn’t…

Look I’m married to a lovely person who I consider to be a bit of a “time thief” so I’m probably just more used to accommodating them, It is genuinely not their intention to be late to everything, at the same time they have an inability to understand the basic constraints of time and space I think…

She generally doesn’t wear a watch (she owns several, which I have bought her), if she is supposed to be somewhere across town at a specific time I need to pester her (and often drive her there) because she’ll be putting her shoes on five minutes before she’s due and has imagined the journey takes mere seconds. Her default arrival time is 15-20 minutes after she was due, she has a true talent for just pissing about, chatting and just consistently doesn’t bother checking the time. her lateness is a running joke with her friends, they are genuinely shocked when she is on time for things (normally because I was involved).

The hillarious thing is that both her mother and me are the oposite way, can’t abide being late and geneerally arrive early to things if we’re not having to deal cajole my missus into being approximately on time…

The thing I’ve learned from all of this is that You simply cannot change time thieves, they are blind to your frustration and they do not learn from their previous mistakes, all you can do is manage them and make allowances; Tell them an earlier time, prompt them to get ready earlier, become more patient…

If this isn’t for you don’t get involved with them socially (or romantically), or just accept that they just don’t get it and 7:15 is their version of 7:00.

If you keep getting upset and berating them it starts to wear on you as well, so you either learn to accept this person has what amounts to a condition and friendship with them involves accommodating that, or you just cut them loose.

We have a rider nicked named “After Eight” 😉  Always LAte.

@cookeaa – what you describe sounds quite debilitating for her to actually live a normal life. Is she capable of getting to critical things on her own when she has to – like catching trains, planes etc?

@cookeaa – what you describe sounds quite debilitating for her to actually live a normal life. Is she capable of getting to critical things on her own when she has to – like catching trains, planes etc?

I don’t think She’d see it that way, she has caught a train on her own, she can get to work (I think they’re reasonably tolerant) but she also refuses to run, If she flys anywhere she’ll be travelling with someone else.

She has been described as “Scatter-brained” by various people and I once told her I don’t consider her to be “reliable” which did piss her off, but not so much that she miraculously changed into someone that wears a watch and makes an effort to leave on time…

You can’t change them, You just have to learn to love them for what they are.

I dunno maybe its some specific flavour of ADHD or a weird cognitive thing where “I need to be somewhere in 15 minutes” doesn’t translate to “I need to be leaving now”.

Either way she’s just not an on time sort of person I don’t think I know anyone as bad as my missus for being generally late. Thus I have learned tolerance and could live with a ride consistently starting 15 mins after the published schedule…

My guess would be that that is a reaction to constantly being hustled to be on time as a kid

My guess would be that that is a reaction to constantly being hustled to be on time as a kid

Or having never needed to do it herself, due to being constantly time-managed by her mother, she never learnt how to do it. Especially if the sister is older.

I really don’t know if there’s a deep seated childhood reason for it.
My point was simply that it’s not intentional (or malicious), it’s simply that some people aren’t wired to prioritise time keeping, even when it impacts others, and seemingly can’t be made to.

The world just has to work around them (and sometimes it just doesn’t), try not to take their behaviour as a personal affront….

If its that much of a problem, why not add ‘no more helping’ to the list of pet hates.

Forgotten allenkey/tyre lever/multitool ? TOUGH

why not add ‘no more helping’ to the list of pet hates.

Forgotten allenkey/tyre lever/multitool ? TOUGH

?

The discussion is around lateness.