What an excellent way to spend the first Sunday in September. As in ‘04 and ‘05 before, I decided to join in on the fun for the third time and participate in the 19th annual NYC Century bike tour (a.k.a. NYC Five Borough tour), organized by the Transportation Alternatives advocacy group. It’s a nice ride through all boroughs of New York City with 6,000 fellow cycling enthusiasts. I always do the 100-mile route. At cruising average speeds of 15 mph it’s easy to do. There are rest stops every 20 miles, or so, with plenty of refreshments to stay strong and staffed with volunteers to help you in case of trouble. Plus, New York City is close to flat, after all.
As in every year, it started at the north side of Central Park at 6:00 am. I got there 15 minutes late and the ride was already underway. Not a problem, it was a staggered start due to so many participating and I had already registered online. All I had to do was to pick up a cue sheet and join other cyclists slowly inching their way toward the start lane. Actually, I preferred it for two reasons: 1. I didn’t need to loiter around for the ride to start and get cold. 2. With all those riders ahead of me, I didn’t need to worry too much about route finding;)
In past years, I’ve done the NYC tour on a MTB, Giant Rainier, and on a steel road bike, Marin Argenta. Today, I was riding Felt F65, my road bike for the past year and a half. This year turned out to be the easiest one. It might have to do something with my level of fitness, I guess, or just that bikes became progressively lighter;). My current one is the lightest and fastest of the three (17.5 lbs). I had a nice steady pace and the morning weather was pleasantly cool and sunny, in the mid 70s to low 80s F. On the note of weather though, we were lucky that the tropical storm Hanna passed by as quickly the night before as it did. It stopped dumping buckets of rain just before midnight (6” altogether) and by Sunday morning roads were dry, with only occasional wet and muddy spots alongside the route. (Bronx seemed to be worse than other boroughs)…
I won’t bore you with route details. You can see the official NYC Century bike tour website for more. Plus, as I was using GPS Garmin Edge 305 to track my progress, I have up my data in MotioBased.com Digest. Feel free to explore it. BTW, the GPS shut off at around mile 89, or I paused it accidentally, no idea, so the route data between Pelhalm Pkwy. N and Tibbett Ave. in the Bronx is only approximate. According to the cue sheet, I missed about 5.4 miles before and after Van Cortland Park rest stop which the Motiobased website assumed that I flew over in a straight line;) The total should have been somewhere between 102 and 103 miles…
I only made one or two wrong turns when leading a pack but was quickly pulled back by fellow riders. I remembered about 2/3 of the route from memory, too. It changes from year to year but not significantly. The only trouble spot was after crossing the Triboro bridge. Due to construction, there was some ‘fancy’ re-routing through gravel dirt roads on the Randall’s Island, more suited to cyclocross than road cycling, and spotty route signing in the Bronx. Usually, volunteers mark the route with spray paint directly on roads and pathways a week before but in the Bronx the signs were hard to find, or non-existent. More than once, I encountered riders going in wrong directions, or simply having no idea which way to turn: no route markings, no clear direction in provided cue sheets. But somehow, we always found the right way. Surprisingly, some of the guys marshaling the ride were lost, too, despite pre-riding it the previous Sunday.
Still, what a great ride. If I’m still in NYC, I will do it again in 2009! Met bunch of great folks, took a few pictures and really enjoyed it. I might just do the 100-mile route again, in a week or two, on my day off. Just for fun… BTW, I have a “sick” idea for the next year NYC Century: What about doing TWO consecutive 100-milers on the same day??? Who’s is with me? It’s doable. We can even use most of the rest stops the second time through…
September 9th, 2008
Posted by
Rich |
Cycling, New York |
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Early start, originally uploaded by Rich.
UPDATE (Sept. 11th, 08): The above photo was featured in the September ‘08 issue of Transportation Alternatives newsletter, the NYC Century bike ride organizer;) Nice…
September 7th, 2008
Posted by
Rich |
Cycling, New York |
one comment
The last Tuesday, I decided to load my bike and head up to Bear Mountain State Park. (See a few pictures on my Flickrmap or directly at Flickr.com) Partly, it was a test for my bike and equipment but I also wanted to do a longer training ride. I did it in two days with an overnight stay at the park. With all my side trips (and wrong turns;)) I did a little over 140 miles, averaged 11.5 mph and climbed about 8,000ft. Here is a map of the trip: NYC to Bear Mountain Adventure with cue sheets, if you decide to do it too;)
So close, yet so far…, originally uploaded by Rich.
Overall, it was a pleasant ride. First day, I enjoyed the ride around Manhattan, over the George Washington Bridge (GWB) onto the River Road in New Jersey, with its ups and downs. After reaching Nyack, I had my lunch at the quintessential cyclist stopover: ‘The Runcible Spoon’. I’m certainly not the first one to claim it: Great apple pies!!! Then, I rode next to the Hudson River, on a bike route #9, through some great dirt trails. I had to carry my bike a few times over fallen trees or push it through some ‘fist-size’ gravel sections but I still had lots of fun. And then, the long climb to the top of Bear Mountain, from zero ft to over 1,300ft in 4.5 or 5 miles. It was a bit windy up there, with a lonely deer following me and finally feasting on one of my apples;) After a few snapshots, I headed down to find a ‘wild’ campsite in the woods, near Seven Lakes Parkway, not far away from the Silver Mine Lake.
Lake Welch Beach, originally uploaded by Rich.
The next morning, I continued on the Seven Lakes Parkway heading south. I passed by some quite beautiful lakes: Tiorati, Askoti, Welch, and many others. Didn’t see many people vacationing as I was there in the middle of the week but there were plenty of workers readying the beaches, parking lots and camps for the unofficial opening of the 2006 summer season during the Memorial Day wekend (May 27-29). Once I left the woods of the Bear Mountain and Harriman State Parks behind, I passed through many small picturesque towns of Rockland county in NY and Bergen county in upper New Jersey on my way back to the city.In terms of equipment, everything went very well, no problems whatsoever. I believe that the Cannondale’s Headshock front-suspension design is quite suitable to off-road touring as it is more stable, has enough travel (80mm) and is completely protected from outside elements. Even the outboard bottom bracket (FSA MegaExo) rarely seen on today’s touring bikes is OK, as long as it is properly maintained. Wheels and tires are rock-solid too. (I already put about 1,000 miles on them). Ortlieb panniers and Tubus rear rack were well worth the expense;) Hope to do one more similar ride before I leave. ONE MONTH TO GO!!! Can’t wait;)))
May 26th, 2006
Posted by
Rich |
Cycling, Equipment, New York, Preparation |
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