Tuesday Moderate Ride – April 29th – 9:00 AM – Panera
This week we will be doing the second annual Tuesday Moderate Hilly North Shore Ride (current manifestation). I have led hill training rides a number of times in the past, and in all honesty, they were not universally beloved. Much to my surprise, last year’s revival of the Hilly North Shore was one of the most popular Tuesday rides. This year participation may be reduced because many of the enthusiasts for last year’s ride are currently in Louisiana (the fourth flattest state with 47% flat land).
Why, you might ask, deliberately seek out hills to ride up when we live somewhere that they can be easily avoided. One of the best ways to get in shape for cycling is by climbing hills, and if you’d like to enjoy rather than suffer through bicycling anywhere else in the country other than Florida, Illinois, North Dakota, and Louisiana, hill training is nearly essential.
Here is a link to the route I will be using: Hilly North Shore · Ride with GPS. If you take a close look at the route, you will notice that it differs significantly from other routes that I have done for club ride. There are far too many rest and lunch stops. All of the lunch stops are actually off the route with directions provided in the cues. The point of this route is to supply some useful information for anyone who would like to pursue some hill training on their own, so I set it up in the expectation that people would plan their own training using the information provided.
We will make our morning rest stop at Moraine Park. The slightly faster group will lunch at La Planha Loca. The classically moderate group will lunch at Mean Weiner. If an afternoon rest stop is required, we will stop at CVS. We will regroup after every hill, so no one has to worry about being left behind. In fact, the ride leader, on a recumbent, is likely to be among the last people up every hill. Between the climbs, I will ride at a moderate (13 – 15 mph) pace. Rob Green will lead the slightly faster group. I am attaching a document with directions about how to skip some of the climbs for those who would like to do the ride, but don’t wish to do all of the hills.
This would be an ideal opportunity for someone more interested in taking pictures than in climbing hills, to take some photos for the scrapbook of EBC members actually riding their bikes, rather than eating or modeling yellow jackets. Just station yourself somewhere along the climb, maybe even near the top, and snap away as the riders come by. If you’d like to try your hand at panoramic photography, you might produce a featured photo for the club’s web site. See Jeff Miller’s email of April 24th for the requirements.
The forecast is for reasonably good Chicago Spring weather: Considerable cloudiness, with a stray shower or thunderstorm possible. The temperature will be about 68 when we start and will drop steadily to around 61 when we finish up. The wind will be out of the west at 15 to 25 mph. If it is necessary to cancel the ride because of the weather, I will post an announcement to the listserv by 7:30 AM.