North Salt Lake City, Utah Three Kings Cycling Race

I'm looking for some tips on this one. I'm pretty happy with the results but feeling a little bit guilty on the settings.

This is my third year shooting the North Salt Lake Three Kings Cycling Event. The race features three significant climbs and is open to anyone. The last couple of years it has attracted a handful of professional riders.

My goal is to first ensure every rider gets a shot or two of themselves in action and second to capture the sense of how steep the climbs are. They arrange a driver for me, so I sit/stand in the backseat of a convertible car. When the riders are chasing us, our speeds are similar. When I'm going against the flow of the race, we can be passing each other at 50mph.

Some of the area is still homes being built, so the scenery is quite hideous (dumpsters - port-a-potties - construction material.) I've kept the lens aperture wide open to get a fast shutter speed and blur undesirable elements. I've shot Aperture Priority just because the light is so variable and action so quick I just don't have time to make changes.

Is there a better way to do this?

I've picked some of my favorites to post, but the entire set can be seen here

IMAGE LINK: https://flic.kr/p/nMk9​qE

IMAGE LINK: https://flic.kr/p/nMjR​7R

IMAGE LINK: https://flic.kr/p/nMjC​9g

IMAGE LINK: https://flic.kr/p/o6B7​RH

I might reduce the headroom in #3, but these look pretty good to me. In the gallery, the subjects are too centered in the first ones. I'd rather see more road & less background or crop like you did in 7th one. OTOH, if you expect them to print a 4X6" one, then framing would be better than cropping.

On the first image, I feel like my eye goes directly to the rider's chest or groin, neither of which are super flattering in an image. Just my opinion...

brycematheson wrote in post #17009589
On the first image, I feel like my eye goes directly to the rider's chest or groin, neither of which are super flattering in an image. Just my opinion...

really have to agree on that one!

the others... they bother me because they're square... not that square is bad, but I just feel the subject doesn't fit in the square frame well

especially the last one - too much empty space on the right and subject is too centered horizontally.