Participating in an official sanctioned century

[will dehne]

Please help.
I need to do an official timed 100 miles in NW Chicago area in March.
I will take part in a cross country tour and this is one of the requirements.
I have been biking a lot (over 7,000 miles in 2005) but riding solo in Illinois, Wisconsin and Minnesota.
Now I do not have connections to do this TT. The local bike club does not start riding until April and I am looking at several inches of snow. I am not happy about cold weather biking.
Questions:
Is there a place to do indoor TT?
If not, is there such a thing as a century ride in March in this area where I can participate? I need to show 100 miles under six hours on a flat course. This should be OK. I have just done a series of these TT in Florida. Unfortunately not officially timed.

[Guest]

I guess if you really don't care about the boredom, and it's not snowing in March, you could hit the lakefront. It's 37.5 miles of flat, connected lakefront (round trip). You could do it 3 times and be done with it. That can be done in way less than 6 hours. Just hope it hasn't snowed and/or if it has snowed, has been fully plowed.

Koffee

[will dehne]

I guess if you really don't care about the boredom, and it's not snowing in March, you could hit the lakefront. It's 37.5 miles of flat, connected lakefront (round trip). You could do it 3 times and be done with it. That can be done in way less than 6 hours. Just hope it hasn't snowed and/or if it has snowed, has been fully plowed.

Koffee

Koffee,
Thanks for your reply. I do not mind the boredom. How do I get it certified? Please excuse if I sound ignorant, I am what they call a lone wolf rider and not in the know for things such as this.
The lakefront in March is a miserable place IMHO.

[sch]

Some suggestions: search on google for Illinois bike clubs, Iowa bike clubs and Indiana bike clubs and start perusing websites for 'official centuries' Ie organized centuries. Many of these do not time their riders but some do. You may be able to get one of the organizers to give you a certificate attesting to your time. Search for duathlons and triathlons, not many tri meets in the north in March but duathlons are around, might be a possibility, they are always timed, but usually a lot shorter than 100mi. Search on the term randonneuring for a group of strange type who feel that 150mi on a bike is too short a ride. They have qualification events all over for long rides and they are 'official'. I googled on this and there were a bunch web sites on randonneuring. The English are gaga about timetrials and 100mi TT abound year around. You might have to join an association but if you have a spare weekend and $500-1000 you could fly there and get certed. Not likely to be flat though, and could be nasty hilly but weather should be amenable to Chicagoans. Here is another website that may be useful: http://www.ultracycling.com/index.html They have qualifying meets all over the place. One in my state at the end of March for qualifying rides between 200 and 500mi, timed of course.

Steve
Addendum: I was in Chicago during the freak warm spell last April and had a great time in the lake front wind tunnel, riding down to the Southern golf club and upto the Catholic university whose name escapes me now. I will be back in late March and hope to be able to bike the Lake shore again, but know the weather is against me. 36-40F is my lower limit. No built in antifreeze.

[will dehne]

Steve:
Thanks for the ideas. I have to take off from work all of May and cannot go to England also. I will check the Internet as you suggest.
I was hoping that there is an indoor biking track where one can do a TT.
That sure would be nice.
If all fails, I will go to a southern state TT.
You wuold think that someone on this forum would know where?