Runners aren’t the only ones with the date of the New York City Marathon circled on their calendars.

For more than two decades, a group of cyclists has taken part in an unofficial, early morning joyride along the closed-off route, indulging in the rare freedom of the unimpeded road each year before the start of the actual footrace.

So it was with great disappointment that they learned this week that the New York Road Runners, the organizers of the marathon, were trying to kick them to the curb.

“Anyone attempting to ride the course ahead of the Marathon — starting in Bay Ridge, Brooklyn — will be diverted and removed by the authorities,” read a statement the organization posted online this week. “We ask that everyone adhere to this restriction.”

Some riders were saddened to lose a beloved yearly ritual. The ride, they said, was something organic in a city where many public events have come to feel overly costly or contrived.

Others were angry, placing the blame on what appeared to be a growing group of riders who pedaled aggressively and treated the event as a time trial, putting the safety of volunteers and pedestrians at risk.