Ride Saturday, October 22

A bit of a warm-up is in store for this weekend, so the ride will start at 08:00 and the route will be to Cannon Falls clockwise. The “early” start time means less head wind on the way out and more time for you to relax (or do yard work) and enjoy the warm afternoon. Expect cool temps at the start — 43 degrees — and 58 degrees by the end of the ride, so layers will be key. It will be partly cloudy with ESE/SE winds from 6 to 10 mph, so not as chilly or windy as last weekend.

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Ride Saturday, October 17

This week, we will start our ride from Rosemount at 09:00. That should give any early morning rain or snow time to clear out and make way for another great ride. We will be riding to Edina, following a route that we did in July, with a stop at Hyland Park in Bloomington. The 54-mile course has a little more elevation gain than last week’s ride. Autumn colors are past peak, but we should still have some great scenery.

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(Zwift) Ride Saturday, October 12

The poor weather this weekend is going to prevent us from doing an outdoor ride, so I’ll be hosting an indoor ride on Zwift. I’ve invited my followers to a 40-mile ride on the London Pretzel route, so look for your invitation for ride at 09:00 Saturday.

Saturday afternoon, I’m going to volunteer with Free Bikes for Kidz and I’d love to see some other RCC members join me. I’ll be there from 12:00 to 15:00, and maybe longer. They have 3 shifts on Saturdays, two shifts on Sundays, and four shifts on weekdays, so you can help out almost anytime you want. You don’t need mechanical skills, because they have jobs for all skill levels. If you’re a bit rusty at the mechanical stuff, you can practice on bikes for the kids, so you’re more comfortable working on your own bike. They provide everything you need, so come out and help share your love for cycling with some kids.

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Rides Saturday and Sunday, Oct 5 & 6

It’s a busy weekend and we have three opportunities for you.

Saturday at 08:00, there’s a meetup on Zwift. We’ll ride the “Dust in the Wind” route in Watopia and talk via Discord during the ride. I’ve invited the club members who follow me and rode together in the game last winter. Follow me on Zwift to get invited to my meetups.

Saturday 10:00 to 16:30 is Free Bikes 4 Kidz annual bike-collection day and they are looking for volunteers to help out with unloading and categorizing bikes. Their volunteer coordinator told me that “any shift, any amount of time would be so helpful.” Their Collection Day signup form has shifts that start at 10:00, 11:00 and 12:30. Breakfast bagels and pizza lunch will be available and you’ll get a FB4K t-shirt. This year, their warehouse is in the south metro at the Southtown Shopping Center in Bloomington at I-494 and Penn Ave. Sign up now.

Sunday at 8:30, we’ll do a group ride from Startbuck’s in Rosemount to somewhere west (Prior Lake or Skakopee). I’ll change up the route to keep it fresh for this late-season ride.

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Ride Saturday, April 6

April showers are coming this weekend, although we should be able to get a ride in on Saturday afternoon. The forecast says it will rain lightly until Noon and then the chance goes way down. and it’s supposed to be in the low 60s. so hopefully we can leave Starbucks at 13:00 (1 PM). We’ll head somewhere south, and if the forecast changes, I’ll send an email by Noon to cancel or change the start time.

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Volunteer Weekend

It's going to be a rainy weekend, so we won’t have a group ride. So, get outside today or jump on a spin bike or trainer to keep up your fitness. Hopefully, we’ll get a few more group rides in before the snow and winter comes to make the roads dangerous for road bikes to end our season.

Please take a couple of hours to volunteer at Free Bikes 4 Kidz this weekend. Volunteers, like you, have already refurbished more than 2,500 bikes. FB4K needs your help to fix about 3,000 more bikes, so they can give them to Minnesota kids in need. Every volunteer and every hour counts. I will be there Saturday, at Noon, and I hope to see you there, too.

Help FB4K meet the goal of refurbishing and giving away every bike that they can salvage. Please, sign up to volunteer! The time you spend changes lives.

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Ride Sunday, October 21

I hope you had a chance to get out for a ride today, like I did, because it was beautiful and this weekend it will be back to abnormally-cold and windy conditions. The forecast for this Saturday is worse than last Saturday, so we’ll ride on Sunday morning. At 09:00 Sunday, we’ll follow the Orchard Lake route, which will provide some shelter from the wind and give us a good workout.

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