Winter Rides

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Mark Kranz reminded me that Saturday is Global Fat Bike Day, so I thought we should celebrate with a ride on the Minnesota River Bottoms Trail. This is an easy, flat trail that anyone can ride. We won't have snow to ride on this weekend, so you can also use a mountain or cycle-cross bike, as many other riders did last Saturday. I think I even saw someone on a road bike last week, so conditions are good for just about any kind of bike.

We will meet at the parking lot on Lyndale Avenue, by I-35W in Bloomington. (We've ridden through there many times, so you should be familiar with it.) We will start riding at 9:00 and ride east toward Cedar Avenue and beyond. You may also join us on the north side of the Cedar Avenue bridge around 9:20 to 9:25. If you ride from Eagan make sure you cross the river and then look for us on the trail north of the river. We'll decide from there where we should ride next.

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Ride Sunday, November 6

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On Saturday, we are hopefully going to get some much-needed rain, so I’ve set up a Zwift ride for those of you who want to do a virtual group ride. You can chat with the group via Discord, which makes the time fly. We’ll continue to schedule Zwift rides for the club on Saturdays until next spring.

Sunday could be the last outdoor group ride of the season. It looks like it will be relatively warm in the morning and windy in the afternoon, so our Orchard Lake route counterclockwise would be a good ride for this late-season ride. It will be 42 to 47 degrees with partly cloudy skies and 7 to 12 mph winds.

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Ride Saturday, November 28

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It’s going to be unseasonably warm Saturday afternoon, so we’re going to have another road ride, which will leave Rosemount at 1 PM and follow our Orchard Lake route. It will be sunny and 47 degrees with a 9 mph SW wind, although it will feel like 42 to 44 degrees. Jack and Martin will be leading the ride, because I have a hike planned with my wife and daughter.

For those of you who ride Zwift, I will continue hosting group rides Saturday mornings at 08:00 throughout the winter. So far this year, we’ve been getting groups of about a dozen riders and we use Discord to chat about cycling and other things during the ride. These rides are about 2 hours of endurance riding, like our outdoor rides, except you can stop any time you want, because you’re always at home.

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Ride Saturday, October 31

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This week, we will be able to ride on the road outside. Starting at 1:00 PM, we will leave Rosemount and ride west to Prior Lake. We’ll skip the jog in downtown Prior Lake and stop at Cleary Lake Regional Park instead. This is a 45 or 55-mile route that we haven’t ridden since July 2019. We can choose the length at around mile 40. It will feel like 40 degrees, with partly sunny skies, temps from 45 to 47 degrees, and west winds at 15 mph.

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(Zwift) Ride Saturday, October 12

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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

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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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Zwift Meetup, December 29

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Last Saturday, six of us did a virtual ride via Zwift and we used Discord to talk to each other during the ride. Our first ride went well, so I'm going use Zwift’s new meet-up feature to do another group ride Saturday. The ride will be Saturday at 09:00 and it will be led by Cory Wagner. This week's ride will follow the NYC Mighty Metropolitan route for 26 miles (42 KM). To join the meetup, you must be a Zwift user who follows Cory, and he needs to invite you to the ride. If you are a Zwift user and you haven’t been invited, follow Cory Wagner and he’ll invite you.

Meetups are like other Zwift events, where you must join the event before the start time. You may join up 15 minutes before the start and you can leave at any time. Don’t be late.

At 09:00, we’ll roll out slowly and get everyone together near the yellow beacon, which is used to help you find the ride leader. Saturday's are very busy on Zwift, so I'll call out my location (mileage) until we are together. Join us on Discord to talk to other riders in our meetup ride group.

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