I did my first (impromptu) group ride today!

The best time I ever had in traffic. I've never done a group ride before and always been a little intimidated, but today it happened on its own.

I don't like to lane split at any sort of speed, but today was bumper-to-bumper all the way home in NYC traffic, so I was lane filtering under 20mph with one bike about a mile ahead of me. I just figured he got tired or something and kept going. By the time I reached him, he was holding out his arm through the lanes like he wanted just me to stop, so I pulled in to the spot next to him.

Sure enough, there was an NYPD cop a few lanes ahead of us, with plenty of shoulder if it wanted to pursue lawbreakers. It's extremely rare to be pulled over by NYPD, but I like to be careful; so, apparently, does everyone else. After a little while, there were 4 bikes including myself all riding together in two lanes side-by-side, stuck behind a cop in bumper to bumper.

Best 45 minutes I've ever spent on a 20 minute commute, and everybody followed all the rules for group riding that I've learned by watching YouTube videos in preparation for someday being a part of one.

TLDR: Cop's presence made 4 bikes stop filtering in stop-and-go traffic. We had a nice group ride home together.