At a regular group training ride in Austin, Masters cyclists are often at the front of the peloton

The notorious group training ride, there's one for every town: In New York it's the Gimbels Ride. In San Diego it's Swami's. In Miami, on Wednesday mornings, the Key Biscayne Hammer Ride takes off before the sun rises and races along a 27-mile route before sprinting up the William M. Powell Bridge -- the ride's lone hill.

And in Atlanta, what's known as the Handshake Ride (as in secret handshake) rotates between four start locations and routes every week. To know about the ride, you must know someone who knows about the ride.

For most passionate road cyclists -- young and old, male and female, fast and slow -- the weekly group ride is an event entrenched in history, camaraderie, and competitiveness. Inexperienced riders come to cut their teeth, while vets show up to sharpen their edges. The 35-and-up Masters racers, many of whom have done these rides for decades, are often the most respected cyclists in the pack.

In Austin, where I live, we do the Austin Tri-Cyclists (ATC) Ride, a year-round Saturday morning throw-down where a slew of Masters racers regularly put the hurt on the pack -- including me, a 27-year-old Cat 1 racer. Here's an account of a typical ATC Ride and the older cyclists who make it go.

Waiting for the ride's 8:30 a.m. start, road racers, triathletes, and avid recreational cyclists congregate in front of the Austin Tri-Cyclists bike shop. It looks like a big red barn, but is actually one of the top triathlon stores in the South. When the weather's nice and there's no race nearby, the pack here can swell to more than 100 riders. "The group is buddy, buddy, for the first 15 minutes or so as you roll out of town," says Kevin Schaefer, 40, a soon to be Cat 2 and media specialist for the State Attorney General's office. "Then you hit Southwest Parkway and it's get the 'F' out of my way!"

As the group swings onto the wide, mostly car-free road that heads into the Texas Hill Country, Schaefer has no problem making his way to the front. He started racing only two and half years ago, but has risen up amateur bike racing's category system -- in which five is the lowest and one is the best -- with astounding speed. "I never gave racing a shot for the first 20 years of my life because, honestly, I didn't have the time," Schaefer says. Now, after leaving a career in television for a more flexible nine-to-five schedule, he logs about 10 to 15 hours of training per week.

At the end of Southwest Parkway lies one of the ATC Ride's biggest prizes: the Bee Caves city limit sign. Located about 15 miles west of Austin, Bee Caves is a burgeoning suburb set among steeply pitched, cedar covered hills. The sign sits atop one of the longer, sharper inclines, a tempting target for bike racers with

a competitive bone in their bodies. If the group hasn't split during the undulating, windswept miles leading up to Bee Caves, the sprint to the sign can seem like a Tour de France stage finish -- everyone thinks they've got a shot.

However, today, former Masters national champion Robbie Robinette, 43, is on the ATC Ride. Thus, the odds of anyone but Robinette winning are significantly diminished. Robinette, who is jokingly referred to as Calve-Zilla (although, never to his face), is tall and strewn with lean, sinewy muscles. He considers sprinting one of his specialties, and when he rises from the saddle at the crest of the hill, about 200 meters from the sign, he immediately gaps the rest of the pack.

Although he didn't start racing seriously until about 10 years ago, Robinette says he's gradually been giving more of himself to the sport, "All within the bounds of realizing that I'm a bit old to be a pro bike racer," he says. "For me the ATC Ride works well as an opener for a Sunday race or, if I'm not racing, I'll extend it into a four- or five-hour ride."

The founder of a highly profitable Austin-based finance company, RGM, Robinette is able to sneak in long weekday training rides by logging into work remotely at night. And, when prepping for big events, he can train at altitude by vacationing at his second home in Durango, Colo.

This year Robinette's been slowed by an early season crash in which he broke a collarbone. His surge for the city limit sign is met with a swift reaction. A couple of female professional riders, Shontelle Gauthier and Jen McRae, follow closely behind. They're two of the best sprinters in the country, and both were born in the late 1960s.

Gauthier, a social worker and Louisiana native who works with Katrina evacuees in Austin, turned pro with Team Ultralink this year after a successful 2006 season. As a life-long athlete (during her 20s she ran five marathons, including Boston, in one year), Gauthier shares the sentiment of many Masters racers. "I wish I would have taken road racing more seriously at an earlier age," she says. "But I don't think much about my age while racing or training. I still feel strong, like I have more to learn and accomplish."

McRae, on the other hand, is making her second run at professional cycling --- this time as a mom. Nine years ago she retired from top-level racing, while leading the national points standings, to start a family. At the time her husband, Chan, was racing professionally in Europe.

Today, two adorable blond daughters later, McRae is back on top of the sport. She does the ATC Ride on those weekends she'd rather stay home with the family than follow the National Racing Calendar with the Advil-Chapstick pro women's team. "I can do the local group rides with the guys and get the same intensity as I would at a national level race," says McRae, who also works as a cycling coach.

Nearing the city limit sign, Robinette holds his lead while Gauthier and McRae cross the imaginary finish line only a few meters back. Behind them, happy to place in the top 10 is Paul Hurdlow, a 48-year-old Cat 4 racer who picked up cycling only four years ago.

While Hurdlow isn't the fittest racer on the ATC Ride, his passion for the sport is unmatched. "In my fantasies I am a one-day classics rider," he says, referring to the hardened European pros that race on the ancient cobblestones of Belgium and Northern France. "In the real world, I am a corporate securities partner with DLA Piper, a global law firm."

Like many well-off Masters racers, Hurdlow uses the best equipment available. For many Masters riders, cycling has become the new golf, a pastime on which gobs of money are spent on apparel, equipment and coaching. Like golf, cycling is also an activity that can take four or five hours or more on a Saturday morning. Hurdlow's road bike, a Moots Vamoots SL, is a titanium dream ride, and the Trek Equinox TTX he uses for time trials is a lightweight, carbon bullet. Both bikes are equipped with SRM power meters -- computers that measure a rider's wattage output. "I'm sure I've spent close to $25,000 on all my bikes and various components," he says.

In addition, Hurdlow pays $285 a month for coaching from Austin-based training center Source Endurance. The structured training plan helps him balance cycling with career and family obligations. "Each ride is an assignment that I work into my daily schedule and don't check off until it's completed," he says. The coaching expense also includes advice ranging from race tactics to proper nutrition -- even pep talks -- as well as periodic physiological testing. As the group straggles into Bee Caves, many riders turn off -- call them the nine-holers -- heading back to the shop where free breakfast tacos and coffee await.

The rest of the group -- the low handicappers, to extend the golf metaphor -- fall in behind John Korioth, who's better known as "College," Lance Armstrong's longtime buddy. In ATC Ride tradition, the 40-year-old Korioth doesn't slow down for those recovering from the sprint and keeps hammering along the 50-mile loop around Lake Austin. With the city limits sign conquered, the dam climb -- a two-mile ascent from the foot of the dam that forms Lake Austin to the top of the hills overlooking Lake Travis -- looms next.

Although Korioth is a Cat 2, he often competes as teammates with Hurdlow in Masters 35+ races, which are categorized by age, not skill level. The bar Korioth owns in Austin's swank warehouse district, Six, is the team's sponsor. Because Armstrong is a partial investor in Six, the bar is named for his sixth and record-breaking Tour de France victory.

While Hurdlow says he cherishes bike racing as a non-work related social outlet, Korioth and other members of Team Six regularly rely on the sport for professional networking. The most audible form of this comes from the team's most recognized member, J.B. Hager of the J.B and Sandy Morning Show on Mix 94.7 FM. Korioth is a regularly featured guest and occasionally even substitutes as a host for the popular show.

Another Team Six member, fellow Masters racer Gregg Ueckert, 40, is the show's primary sponsor and airs commercials for his aesthetic dentistry practice on the radio station. But as the pack hits the lower slopes of the road rising from the lake, what a cyclist does for a living is meaningless in comparison to how fast he can go up hill.

After years spent as Armstrong's primary Austin training partner, Korioth has shed the extra weight from his ox-likeframe, while maintaining the tenacity that made him a varsity point guard in college. He pedals to the front and strings out the 20 or so remaining riders into a long line, then attacks at the steepest pitch. The group shatters with the top riders disappearing over the summit of the climb.

They'll stop at the next intersection to fill their water bottles, slap each other on the back, and decide . . . where to next?