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FROM THE SUMMIT
It’s January now and the holiday season is over for most of us. There is nothing to do but look forward to our next official national holiday---Valentines Day! To help alleviate these winter doldrums, the popular Progressive Ride Series will begin on Sunday January 14 th, with a flat 35 mile ride and culminating with the worker’s ride of the Primavera Century route in late March or early April. In 1999, serving as co-ride coordinator with Karen White, I determined to fill a gap, and initiated the progressive rides as a complement to the already well established Cinderella Training Rides. Although the Cinderella Training Rides were well recognized as a solid, well organized club program, these rides were designed principally for only women club members.. We introduced this ride series as the Progressive Mileage Road Tour, available to all club members wishing to complete a century ride in the coming season, in addition to giving club members a chance to ride new routes. With the exception of 2001, these rides continued every year since. Darryl Wilson coordinated this series for most of those years, with brief turns at bat by Karen and Jamie Hyams. Darryl made many improvements over the years including the induction of many new routes, made a welcome name change, introduced multiple paces (B and M) for each ride, and implemented the idea of rescheduling rained-out rides. Many thanks to him and all the ride leaders who helped make each year’s series a success. This year we plan to continue to offer both M, and B paced rides, and we welcome the participation of other paces, i.e., T or F. To add a pace, either contact me before the newsletter deadline, or do a “short notice” listing on the Yahoo page according to our rules (see the FFBC website: Home\Rides\Pedal Pounders Policy). We are making one other change this year. The ride series will NOT be postponed if a ride is rained out. The following week’s ride will go on as scheduled. Participants are encouraged to get some extra riding in to make up for the missed ride. I will be leading many of the rides, but not all. To make this year’s Progressive Ride Series a success, volunteer ride leaders are needed for the M and B paces. If you have been participating in a lot of club rides, and feel a little guilty by not taking your turn at the front, this ride series is a great way to begin leading rides. The routes are created, the start locations and dates are defined, and route sheets will be provided. To lead a ride, it is only necessary to let me know you are willing to lead one of these rides and show up at the ride with a sign-up sheet! Although it is often difficult, ride leaders are requested to maintain the ride pace listed for your ride (see beginning of this month’s ride schedule for the guidelines), this will add consistency, and support the intent of this series. Hopefully, this ride series, along with the Cinderella’s, will bring out many club members who have been letting cobwebs grow on their bikes. So, squash those nasty black widows, pump up your tires, and put yourself on that seat! This is the year you will excel! Ride Leader IncentivesStarting this month (Jan., 2007), the club will be honoring the previous month’s ride leaders with a monthly drawing. This will continue throughout the year. The winning ride leader will be drawn from a “hat” containing the names of the previous month’s ride leaders at the club meeting. Even though we have several club members who often lead more than one ride each month (and they are much appreciated), there will be only one chance in the “hat” for each ride leader. Sorry, no “show and go”, or “short notice” ride leaders will be included. The other ride leader incentive program will continue. This is the incentive program that gives various items of clothing to ride leaders who lead a certain number of rides throughout the year Also if you take the place of a listed ride leader and lead that particular ride, let me know as that you can get ride leader credit. Jim Herman, |
