Deja Vu????

Koppenberg has been Postponed to April 3rd!

Koppenberg Circuit, Saturday, April 3rd
UPDATE 3/26/10 1:40pm -
We are postponing the race until next Saturday, April 3rd. Thanks for your patience. The snow did not melt as much as we expected and the impending weather keeps looking worse. We did line up a gravel dump to help our cause but after consulting with our soil experts, it may not have made much of difference if there was still some deep snow.

Next week's weather is much dryer so a much less chance of a mud issue. It's not much more work for us to delay one week, especially if we could avoid a cluster.

Next week, same plan. As we threatened last year, we will go ahead with the race no matter the conditions. Worst case, Sunday's weather looks great, so the 9:45am wave should happen and definitely the 11:40 and later waves will be on.

Here are the expected options ...
A. It will be dry and racing will proceed as normal.

Sundays "A" field results look like a 40+ masters field, right? A fluke maybe, well look at the last "A" field results and it looks pretty similar.

I apologize for not doing this story justice by not going into great depth but isn't it amazing that many of the fast guys in Colorado are over 35 years of age?

Let's name drop here for a moment

When you ride on that big group ride, how consciously aware are you to the image you create, the snapshot in others minds and the connectedness you have with the environment around you? Every time we throw a leg over the top tube we instantly become a representative of cycling and that representation can exponentially grow as the size of the group does. Much like the related current term of "conscious capitalism" one can think of this as "conscious cycling", specifically in regards to group rides as "enjoying the ride while being mindful of others within the group and those sharing the same resources as you". That statement can also apply to individual road riders, mountain bikers, commuters, and even those in others sports like running, rock climbing etc.

The Boulder County Sheriff's Office is looking for means to get the cycling community to "Self-Police" themselves while reaching out to cyclists to understand our side of the story, express problem areas, educate law breaking group rides and communicate the law without having to engage in strict enforcement. The Boulder County Department of Transportation is also engaged in an outreach program with the recent survey on motorist and cyclist tensions in the canyons. The Cyclist/Motorist Canyon Work Group was created by Boulder County Transportation and they really are looking for successful means to have cyclists and motorist exist in harmony on our roads.

Conscious Cycling

Hopefully, the majority of the readers of this site are already practicing "Conscious Cycling" and to some degree they Self-Police their peers in daily cycling activities, whether its riding solo or on a club ride. It's that 10% that refuses to be respectful and courteous to other road users and who tarnish the county-wide image of cyclists. It is also that 10% who spark the type of comments we've all heard at some time or another, "you aren't one of those guys flying down hwy 36 taking up the whole traffic lane are you?" Don't you get tired of trying to defend the image of group riding?

Self-policing is perhaps the best tool to help ensure we have access, safety, and fun as we ride with our peers. It will also require leaders willing to speak up and break the large group you're in into several smaller groups or say something when the group ride you are on fans out into the traffic lane and impedes the flow of traffic? That's exactly what needs to happen if the group rides of Boulder County are going to survive the ever growing use of roadways by both motorists and cyclists. The County and the Sheriff's Office can't attempt to educate cyclists and motorists forever. If we don't learn from that education, group rides like Gateway and Bustop could receive increased attention from the County, potentially causing them to disappear from Boulder County altogether. The time to clean up our act is now as group rides could be gone tomorrow.

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303Cycling caught up with the promoter of the Hell of the Wolf Ride to talk about their ride. This is one of the earliest Colorado bike tours starting in under a month on April 18th! Are you ready? Next week Tyler Hamilton will provide us with a training plan rides just like this one, stay tuned!

This will be the 8th official running (or riding) of the Hell Of the Wolf Loop (H.O.W.L.) Ride. This year’s fully-supported ride will be a non partisan, non political appreciation ride for Governor Bill Ritter for his many contributions to Colorado including green technology, jobs, healthcare for low income families, making roads safer for cyclists and teaming up with Lance Armstrong to bring professional bike racing back to Colorado in 2011!

This year, past Olympic Medalists will be riding, including Gold Medalist Connie Carpenter-Phinney, Bronze Medalist and first American to win a stage in the Tour de France, Davis Phinney and seven time, Tour de France rider Ron Kiefel. Other cycling legends and celebrities will be among the estimated 1,000 cyclists for the 8th Annual H.O.W.L. ride.

Former three-time Colorado State Cycling Champion Bob Shaver started the ride. He has this to say about the event and changes for this year:

“For the fit cyclist the H.O.W.L. does not present itself as a particularly challenging ride. That has never been its intention but rather a ride to do with friends. We have lots of exciting changes for 2010. The foremost will be many more riders! Because of this we’ve had to make some route changes but we also have much more support in terms of rider safety. We will have police marshalling the intersections so we can ride interrupted through town as we do the “town loop” through Castle Rock.

This year the new route will take us through a scenic residential area to Larkspur. We’ll catch part of Larkspur as we head south to Palmer. From Larkspur the riders encounter rolling hills; a couple of those are pack breakers, with short fun descents. The road flattens at the final descent before Palmer Lake.
Traditionally we would stop at Palmer Lake and wait for stragglers. This year for those of us not in the best of form, we will stop for a well-stocked rest stop.