peloton

noun

1. A group of riders formed during a cycling road race; especially, the main group of riders; the pack.

   “The summit of the climb came 38km from the end of stage 14, which began in Limoux and ended in Foix in the foothills of the Pyrenees, and the incident occurred as the peloton emerged into the light and passed under the banner at the top, a quarter of an hour behind a five-man breakaway.”

2. (historical)Synonym of platoon (“a small group of soldiers”) or section (cognate with the former; not invariably synonymous with it, depending on century of use).

   “And so here, I suppose you intend to make a stand against your followers, Ranald—voto a Dios, as the Spaniard says—a very pretty position—as pretty a position for a small peloton of men as I have seen in my service—no enemy can come towards it by the road without being at the mercy of cannon and musket.”

   “A regiment of cavalry consists of six squadrons, each squadron of four pelotons, each peloton of two companies, each company of two escouardes, and each escouarde of two men.”

   “Then the chief of each peloton came forward, snapped fingers with us as we sat on our chairs under the tree, our guards ranged on the right, a mob of gazers—women scratching and boys pulling—on the left, and an open space in front.”

   “In Bauske, on 2 July, the local commandant had twenty hostages publicly shot at the Memel bridge by a peloton supplied by the local headquarters, allegedly in "reprisal" for the German soldiers who had fallen in the battles for the town.”