Tandem Cycling - great western bike rally!

Got my wife to sign off on the idea! Will have my 4 young boys, wife, tandem and lots of other bikes! Come say hi if you see me - should have a cold beer on ice within close proximity!!

Should be a good time

Beer
Bbq
Bikes
My Boys

Yes!

Keith

You're going to have a great time. Weather looks promising. We did the 100K last year and it was a bit warm.

We'll be there this year for sure.
In fact, we are part way there now in our camper with a planned stop or two a long the way to get in a little riding. Arriving Thursday and will be in the camp ground on the side nearest the covered arena (hopefully). Plan to stay until late Sunday or early Monday.
We love this event. Riding this general area as well as over to the coast is as good as it gets. The temps look perfect so we should have a great long weekend of fun. We have a couple of C'dale tandems with us....left the singles at home but brought the Jeep. We'll keep an eye out for you.

Bill J.

Sounds like a great time, wish I was done with my Bilenky :(

Awesome! Pretty excited, almost have the wife convinced she can do the women's ride! :thumb:

Will be in the dodge camper van with popup/f250 sag mobile, white red cannondale tandem lots of kids - goofy grins. Hoping to ride the metric on the tandem.

Regards,
Keith

If you got kids make sure you take them out to Star Farms to go swimming. It's and easy ride and lots of fun!

If you got kids make sure you take them out to Star Farms to go swimming. It's and easy ride and lots of fun!
+1, our family has had great times there.

I just wish there were more organized mass starts at GWBR. We enjoyed the camping and such, but it always felt that we were riding alone... At least now there are the century rides and the women's rides that do have a group start. We won't be there this year, as we are in Denmark. Our summer trip will be to the island of Bornholm...

Hope you all have a great time and good weather!

My friends and I rode the century at the 2011 rally. The countryside is beautiful, they have a lot of nice volunteers, and they had a great mechanic on the route, but we will likely not be riding again.


Check-in packets: Right off the bat, when we checked-in each member in our party had some key item missing from his or her packet - wrist bands, meal tickets, ride patches, etc. If you had purchased a jersey or other item, you had to ask for it because the staff weren't checking the print-out. I don't know what would've happened had one of us not noticed items were missing. SOL?

Holding out food: At one rest stop, the volunteers were offering PBJ-on-white (Bimbo brand), cheap cookies and slices of fruit...and kept bags full of bagels and muffins tucked under tables behind them, out of reach of the riders. We asked for bagels and they kept saying, "Okay, just a minute," but didn't stop making PBJ, and didn't bring out the bagels.

Route marking: The route was poorly marked at many points, particularly in residential and business areas, and all members of our party found themselves off-route at some point during the ride. Very frustrating having to double-back, particularly since a powerful headwind came up on the coastal portion of the ride. One rider who got lost called for ride support and was told they couldn't do anything for him because "he was off the route"!?!?

Meal, drink not included: We all paid for the BBQ lunch after the ride, and it was fine...but you discover a drink isn't included after you've walked through the serving line. Your drink costs extra. After what we'd paid and how far we'd ridden, it just seemed kind of petty. If you forget to carry cash with you on the century, you'll be drinking whatever you have left in your Camelbak with your plate lunch.

I hope to be there. I do a fair amount of biking in that area. The ride to Hell and back is always nice (if the road surface is not too torn up or under construction).