Central Park ride tonight

I'll be in the park tonight as per normal - its a little cooler now and will be dark shortly after 7pm so long sleeves and lights are a must...

Central park ride tonight

7pm, 90th & 5th at Engineer's gate - all welcome.
I'll be doing 3 or 4 laps...

Bike MS training ride in Manhattan this weekend

In conjunction with NYC's City Streets event this weekend, Bike MS is organizing an everyone-welcome training ride that will depart from the Summer Streets Bike MS Booth in Foley Square (Lafayette St between Worth St and Duane St).
Please RSVP to bikeMS@msnyc.org if you plan on attending this training ride. The 2009 Summer Streets will temporarily close off the traffic along Park Avenue and connecting streets from the Brooklyn Bridge to Central Park on August 8, 15 and 22. Click here to learn more about Summer Streets.
Date: Saturday, August 15
Location: Summer Streets Bike MS Booth at Foley Square (Lafayette St between Worth St and Duane St)
Time: 8:00am
Route Information: Enjoy all Summer Streets has to offer on a training ride for all levels. Route options include 14, 20 and 60 miles. Please note that majority of the 60 mile route will be on shared roads and is for advanced cyclists only. The 14 and 20 mile routes are perfect for beginner and intermediate riders and are on closed roads. Click on your preferred training ride option to view the cue sheet; 14/20 mile route or 60 mile route.

Now what?

So yesterday was the big ride. I hope you all had as much fun as I did, and I also hope you're all less sore than I am. But while you rest your legs today, it's time to give your fingers a workout by sending more fundraising emails. The MS Society is counting on raising an additional $1 million between now and the fundraising prize deadline of November 23. But they can't do it without a strong showing from the Top Tier teams like ours.

Now is the time to tell everyone about your ride. Tell them how hard you worked. Tell them how early you had to wake up. Tell them how many weird protein bars you ate. Tell them how bad everything below your waist feels today. And tell them it's not too late to sponsor you.

I'm attaching the email I sent out to my company below. It's a tech company, hence the geeky p.s., but even non-geeks should click on the "Google Earth export" of the route (you'll need Google Earth installed, of course). It's pretty cool.

Feel free to use my email for inspiration, raw material, or wholesale plagiarism. I don't mind. The key is to make your effort personal and real, and wallets will start opening up.

It was great to see so many old and new Credit Suisse faces yesterday. I'll see you at the awards party and at next year's Tour!

-joel

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Well, I did it. 117 miles total (I had to get to the starting line and home afterwards, didn't I?).

It was a beautiful day, a huge turnout, and I hit my goal of 100 miles in under 6 hours. The hills were as big as I remembered (well over a mile of climbing all told), but my legs somehow held out and I'm not in any pain today except pretty much everything below my eyebrows.

But though the ride may be over, fear not, fundraising continues! You can sponsor me with cash or a check payable to National MS Society, or by credit card online (preferred by the MS folks).

For those of you who've already sponsored me, thank you so much for your support. For everyone else, I'd just like to reiterate that this is an important cause for me, so anything you'd care to donate is greatly appreciated. Also, just FYI, all the cool kids are doing it.

Thanks,

-joel

p.s. Attention geeks and/or athletes! You can see my mile-by-mile progress here. All that data came from a pretty cool little app for GPS phones called Bones In Motion Active. I just told my phone to start and end recording and it tracked my progress. Afterwards it uploads the data to their site to calculate elevation changes, calorie output, and more. It generates maps (including topographical ones) can output blog entries and Google Earth exports (very very sweet), and lets you compare training sessions over time, virtually race against others on the same course, and more.

There are no airtime charges and no hardware to buy (as long as your phone is supported). The only knock against it is you need a fully charged battery for a long event like this, and GPS signals are affected by buildings and trees, so the maps indicate that I occasionally rode the wrong way down some highways, into the Hudson river, through several buildings, etc. I didn't.

Alternative Training rides in NJ this weekend

For those team members living in Mid/Western New Jersey who need a training ride this weekend, one of Team CS (Robin Lauezzari) lead a Sunday Morning Ride for the Cyclecraft Long Valley Ride Group that leaves the Riverside Health Club on Rte 57 in Mansfield NJ at 7am. They do a rolling 25 mile ride. Pace depending on ability of participants - no drops.
In addition Robin also rides with the core Cyclecraft Team on Saturday Morning leaving the Cyclecraft store in Long Valley at 7am- Distance is anywhere between 25 and 40 miles depending on our schedules. Average pace is normally 16/17mph (be warned they cover some pretty decent hills).
Robin would be happy to have interested CS team members join in. Contact him by email or on his direct line 212 538 4763.

Sunday 30th Training ride

2nd training ride this Sunday: Open to anyone who wants to venture a little further than central park. The meeting places are linked to the right of the blog. 9am will be Engineer's gate (90th & 5th) and then approx 9:30-9:45 we'll meet at the NJ side of the GWB (just under the I-95) - from there we'll split into groups depending on pace & distance people want to ride.
This week the pace group (17/18 mph) will push onto Nyack whilst the survivor group (15 mph) will repeat last week's ride to Piermont
The route will be follow this waypoint map (point 3 is Piermont, point 4 is Nyack).
Hope to see some of you there.

Thursday evening ride

Another opportunity to ride in Central Park again tonight from 7pm. Darryl will be leading the charge tonight. It will be dark even during the 1st loop so I'd advise lights and as ever a helmet. The roads in the park are closed to traffic after 7pm. Meet at Engineer's gate (90th & 5th). Darryl's steed is a dark blue Trek Madone. Darryl's the rakishly handsome Aussie bloke on it.

Nightrider (Tuesday training ride)

Corny blog entry I know - but have to keep the flow going some how don't I? Its also getting reasonably dark in the evenings so the blog entry is amost appropriate.

I'll be riding in the park again tonight (Tuesday) from 7pm - meeting at Engineer's gate. Team CS jersey is in the wash following Sunday's training ride so I should be decked out in Red & White "L'Alpe D'Huez" jersey. All invited - no set pace & we'll ride the 6 mile loop 1, 2 or 3 times depending on interest.

Sunday: Weekend training ride

This Sunday we'll be offering a training ride to anyone who wants to venture a little further than central park. The meeting places are linked to the right of the blog. 9am will be Engineer's gate (90th & 5th) and then approx 9:30 we'll meet at the NJ side of the GWB (just under the I-95) - from there we'll split into groups depending on pace & distance people want to ride. The route will be roughly this (we'lleither goto point 3 in Piermont or 4 in Nyack).
Hope to see some of you there.

No Training ride this weekend

Unfortunately the training ride scheduled for tomorrow (Sunday) will not be going ahead. Darryl, myself and our deputy ride leaders are all out of town. Evening rides in Central Park will continue from Tuesday and the ride next Sunday is on - more details later in the week.

Let's get training, Part 2: Central park twighlight rides

In addition to the Sunday training rides (see this post below) - We're adding some week-night opportunities to all-comers to put a bit of training in round the 6-mile loop inside Central Park.

I'll be riding most Tuesday and Thursday evenings starting on the 11th up to the week of the MS ride.

The plan is simple: meet at 7pm at Engineer's gate (90th & 5th) & ride the loop 1, 2 or more times depending on personal choice. There will be no set pace, but if there are sufficient takers, we can arrange groups ad hoc.

The evenings are drawing in so its likely to get dark during the ride - I recommend lights on your bike and obviously a helmet.

Look for me (or another team CS member) in the blue & yellow Credit Suisse jersey from last year's ride.

Riding a bike in the big city

Most of us live in or near to NYC and as such riding a bike is often difficult. There are a number of excellent bike paths available in the 5 boroughs that are traffic-free - here's info about them and some riding further afield:

Transportation Alternatives - has great maps (in super detail) of all the official bike paths in the greater NYC area (including suburban NY, NJ and CT)

Bike Hudson Valley - going North from the city? This site has some great rides and info (including a section on living/riding in metro NYC area)

NYC Bike Maps - Uses Google maps to show the bike paths in and around the city.