yankeefan

Sounds like cycle specific clothing would be easier to handle than just general sports/outdoor apparel. Arm/leg/knee warmers and a cycle specific outershell usually fold very compact and fit in jersey back pockets without fuss. Its what I've been using lately on my rides, since when I get to the GWB at 7am its low 40's and by time I'm riding back to the city around midday its low 60's.

NYRhyme

to those who think the tour is too pedestrian, you can pay for a vip spot and get the jump on everyone. The VIP does cost an arm and leg though. I've done it twice and probably won't do it again, but it's about experiencing it.

yankeefan

Or become a charity rider and get other people to pay for it

NYRhyme

you sly devil, you. To those interested as well they also started timing your verrazano sprint if you're VIP as well I believe.

leob1

I got wave one this year! That means I need to be on a 05:30 AM train, that sucks.
I was in wave three last year, plan on lots of stopping. Even the slightest incline is enough to bring things to a stand still, that sucks.

It's a different experience between the first and third waves. My plan is to sprint up 6th ave to the park, I'll be in front of enough people that I won't get caught at a hill(bridge).
I think that's better than passing 10,000 people.
Either way, just go with what ever happens and Enjoy The Ride!

leob1

What I do is put a seat post rack on my bike, then get a sting bag and wrap a bungee around it. When it gets warm, put the leag warmers, jacket, etc, in the string bag and bungee it back on. OR do like my buddy did, wear an old shirt of light jacket, when it gets warm, donate it to the people of NY(just leave it at a rest area).
Just don't wear a backpack, the police don't like seeing that at all.

Vonruden

It will probably be in the 50's at start time, warming up to mid 70's during the ride. I usually wear some warmer clothes that I planned on donating and remove just before the start. You can place in a bag next to trash so as not to litter, however most likely a happy new owner will claim them.

So what will everyone be riding sunday??? Pic please. My company is one of the main sponsor, so have the preferred pass with early start and plan to ride the Peg.

Solidjake

I will be at the 730 start (arriving around 645 or so). I will probably wear shorts, maybe knee warmers for a bit and a long sleeve with my short sleeve jersey over it.

yankeefan

I've been demoted to the second wave. I'm riding this



Got a new wheelset a couple days ago and was planning on riding to nyack this morning via River Rd in order to the wheel through the paces...but then I remembered I'm a grad student with tons of research papers to write and exams in three weeks . Gotta wait till Sunday to give them their official debut.

Any of you guys wanna meetup in SI for beer/recovery while we wait for the ferry traffic to wither out?

Also, how do you plan on affixing your RIK # to your jersey? Tape?

Also, regarding bike security...are any of you bringing a lock? How do you plan on securing your bike if you have to take a bathroom break?

SBinNYC

Please do not leave any clothing or other articles, neatly piled or not, along the route or nearby. The organizers are not equipped to handle it. Neither are the police, who might mistake it as a suspicious package.

If you can wear it, you should be able to carry it.

1nterceptor

I'm a volunteer rider assist again. If you see a marshal
on a green Bromtpon folding bike; say "hello"!

FIVE BORO BIKE TOUR by 1nterceptor, on Flickr

streetstomper

Good point. It should be obvious that that's a bad idea in today's world of security theater. After all, these are the same people who tell us we can't have backpacks, handlebar bags, trunk racks, hydration packs, etc. They want us to be afraid of everything, up to and including "suspicious" packages on the route. "If you see something, say something."

sh00k

Ahhhh! i found this thread too late! did the ride with my wife and enjoyed every minute of it. this was our first time doing it and i would say that this ride is one of the most fun things to do in nyc. a friend of mine finished in 3.5 hours but my wife and i were riding for leisure. we started around 930 and ended the ride at 3. along the way, met tons of nice people, took a ton of selfies on all the scenic spots it was an amazing experience.

My thoughts on the day:
- the weather was perfect (read: i did not overheat at all )
- loved all of the course marshalls, helpers, mechanics, etc. also loved all the people rooting us on in each borough. just as the ride was getting tedious, the cheers helped us move along
- the verrazano climb was dreaded by everyone i spoke to but my wife and i had no problem with it at all. i was on a trek fx 7.4 and she had my older 7.3.
- i felt so bad for the out-of-towners on 50lb rental bikes trying to do it. i saw so many people bailing out after 20-30 miles.
- also feel bad as i heard a story about a person hitting a pothole and landing face first onto the pavement. she was okay but bruised her face quite badly
- it was nowhere near as congested of a ride as my friends had mentioned. sure, it got slow at some points but for 98% of the ride, we were riding perfectly, without obstructions. slower people generally kept to the right and that helped immensely. most people had biker etiquette which i appreciated a lot!
- the festival was overcrowded. once we got there, we drank some nestle quick and then left to head back to manhattan for food. i think the festival space was tiny and people had their bikes sprawled all over the areas where the food cart lines were. too disorganized unlike the entire ride which was well organized.

just my list of random thoughts. overall, enjoyed it thoroughly and wish nyc would do this more frequently than once a year

yankeefan

I didn't get my KOM on the Verrazano

Day started horribly when I got a left hook one block away from the starting line. Derailleur hanger got bent pretty nasty but I managed to straighten it out. Apart from that it was a good ride.

indyfabz

My bud did it again this year. He's originally from Astoria and lived in the Ravenswood Projects for the first five years of his life. This was at least his fourth time. He and I first did it 15 or so years ago. I vowed never to do it again. He won't be returning after this year.

"I had thought the introduction of a staggeredstart for the 5-Boro Ride -- four starts times with an hour between each --would have improved the ride and solved, or at least reduced, the congestionproblem. No way. It got worse!!! We were inthe third group, starting at 8:45 am. We didn’t get back toManhattan until 6 pm. The average speed on my bike computer was 7.7mph – the slowest 42 mile ride I’ve ever done. "

"From the 59[SUP]th[/SUP] Streetbridge to Astoria Park wasn’t bad, but, when we got to the park we were toldthe rest stop was closing in 15 minutes. That was okay with us, becausewe didn’t really need to stop, but then we realized that a lot of the earlierriders had lingered at the park and now also would be departing. Thisdefeated all of the benefits of the staggered start, and caused a wait of atleast 45 minutes just to get out of the park. To make matters worse, theexit line we were in took us right in front of a bank fifty or soporta-potties. So you have a line of bikes two to three deep separatingthe porta-potties from the hundreds of riders lined up on the other side of thebikes who needed to use them, and no room for anyone to move out of the waybecause they had cordoned off the open field behind the porta-potties thatwould have allowed the bikes to freely move to the exit road. Amazingly bad planning!"
"You’ll recall that leavingAstoria Park, the route takes us back through Astoria and Long Island City tothe 59[SUP]th[/SUP] Street Bridge, and then under the bridge and intoBrooklyn. Since they had closed the Astoria Park rest stop, by thetime we got to the 59[SUP]th[/SUP] Street bridge, we were met by the riderscoming over the bridge who were now being re-routed south to Brooklyn. From that point, until the route took us onto the BQE (US 278), the ride movedin fits and starts. We would stop for long periods at different pointsfor no apparent reason. The last rest stop before the VerrazanoBridge (which was under the Brooklyn Heights Promenade) offered free Chipotletacos, but the lines were so long that we just grabbed a banana, filled our waterbottles, and moved on. At the finish point in Staten Island we boughtchicken souvlaki wraps from a vendor, which turned out to be really good. We left the finish point at about 3:45 and did the 2-3 mile ride to the ferrylanding, which turned out to be the nicest portion of the ride. Once wegot to the ferry landing area, we had to wait in a line that extended all theway up to the business district for over an hour before we got on the ferry!"

"Further on the negative side,not only did the majority of riders not know how to ride, they didn’t know howto use the porta-potties. I noticed that many of them didn’t know to turnthe handle after they entered, so there were many embarrassing door openings ofoccupied units. [My wife] commented that in every one she entered, she foundurine sprayed on and around the toilet seat, something she rarely sees on otherrides. So the guys on this ride couldn’t figure out there was urinal ineach unit and couldn’t be bothered to lift the toilet seat when they peed."

sh00k

yankee fan - glad you were able to still participate!

indy - what your friend said is very true - i was one of the ones that was re-routed to brooklyn off the 59th street bridge so they forced us to skip the loop to/from astoria park

re: the portapotties/ people walking by - i can't believe that wasn't planned properly! what the hell! sounds like they didn't even consider that would happen... :/

in my case, we did stop maybe 3-4 times with nypd helicopters overhead but the LONGEST stop was maybe 10 minutes and i didn't think it was that bad. i was also riding for leisure which makes a difference. and we were also stuck on the ferry line for well over an hour. waiting there was bad but when i sat down in the ferry (sitting for the first time in ~7 hours), it felt amazing! haha

re: dirty portapotties - i have never seen a clean one and i think any event that has a ton of people, this is the end result of the portapotties - concerts, rides like this, festivals, etc.

sorry to hear about your friends experience. thats really gotta suck especially since he's been doing this a while

Sy Reene

Not sure I understand Indy's friend's rhetoric. I was in the 3rd/pink group, went thru the long exit line at Astoria park (after refilling water bottle, etc.) which admittedly was kinda a logjammed mess, hung out at the finish festival for about another half hour, and was back in manhattan by 2:30pm. I don't know how your friend didn't get back til 6pm. BTW, The spray in the porta potties could well be from females who didn't want to sit (perhaps quite understandably) on the toilet seats. Average speed (when moving -- my computer stops tracking below 2mph) was 12.7 mph. I really found it a quite enjoyable ride given the immense crowd that participated.

velofinds

Agreed. I, too, was in the 3rd group, and all things considered, I thought it was a great ride. It was my first time, and I would do it again.

indyfabz

The "rhetoric" is what it is--a description of his experience. Over an hour wait for the ferry? Forty-five minutes just to get out of a rest stop? Seriously? After last year's MS 150 City-to-Shore (7,000+ people) I decided that my 23rd consecutive year participating in that event would be my last. One major reason was that at the staggered start, riders are put into what amount to human cattle pens. Two out of the last three years I had to wait in one of those pens for about forty-five minutes. I am not a cow.

When I first did the Five Boro some 15 years ago I was really excited. At the time, I was good friends with the woman who ran the bike advocacy agency in Philly. She told me it was not going to be the "bike love-in" I envisioned. There would be poor riding. People weaving in and out of the crowd. People stopping without warning. She even told me that some people buy bikes just so they can do the ride. Her prediction was accurate. Not my sort of event.

yankeefan

It was my first time doing the tour, and honestly I think it really depends on what you make of it. The tour is disproportionately made up of warm weather cyclists so obviously many of them have little understanding of group riding protocol. If you go there anticipating a hammerfest with a 20mph average speed and a peleton executing textbook pacelines you'll be sorely disappointed. The pace is closer to that of a sunday morning family park ride but the good thing was that there was an implicit understanding among participants that slower moving cyclists stay to the right and the left lane was for people who wanted to go a bit of a faster pace. This made riding over the bridges very enjoyable as I didn't have people randomly stopping in front of me to walk their bike -- everyone on the far left were all very fit cyclists who had no problems climbing the minor grades. As much as I joked about wanting a KOM over the Verrazano the tour really isn't for people who want to spend their day staring at their power zones and/or average speed. The pace is intentionally slow because its meant to allow for sightseeing on roads/bridges that are normally closed to cyclists. You really shouldn't bash the 5BBT because it doesn't compare to your fast paced weekly group ride or the Giro d'Italia.

That being said, a lot of riders (including a guy on my charity team) had zero bike handling skills and were swerving all over the place and trying to squeeze into gaps without signalling their intentions. I witnessed a few crashes and was almost the victim of one. These things are unavoidable though, as even the best occasionally end up with the rubber side up when they're in the bunch. There were several massive logistics failures (Astoria Park anyone?) but it should be expected given that many of the marshalls/stewards were volunteers with little experience in coordinating a mass event. I was skeptical of the tour before I rode it but having done it now I think its a very good event when you consider what its purpose is. That being said, I don't see myself doing it again unless I'm riding with friends who are casual cyclists themselves. Us "serious" enthusiasts would find the leisurely pace and constant stopping to be rather unbearable.

Edit: I saw quite a few kids at the finish festival and on the ride back to the ferry and its really impressive that they were able to finish the tour. The pace was slow but I'm sure most kids would have gotten restless. Some of them climbed exceptionally well, though that should be expected given how little they weigh.

Solidjake

For the second time doing the tour, it was a big achievement for me. This year I did it alone but decided to do the earliest start at 0730. I was a few blocks back in the start line but I slowly made my way up front. Overtook a lot on 6th ave and in Central park and kept progressing. I only stopped at the Astoria Park rest area and continued with everyone that was up front. Went all the way to the finish line in the top 120 or so and did it in about 2hrs and 22min. Felt so good to be up front with everyone and hauling. Good thing my body was actually not tired and was taking it very good with me keeping myself nourished throughout the ride.

https://www.strava.com/activities/297299248

indyfabz

If you are referring to my bud, that is not what he did. As noted, he had done the ride several times before so he was familiar with some of the issues involved and actually thought the staggered start was going to help things. Nowhere did he (or I) even impliedly, much less expressly, bash the event because it wasn't a fast paced ride. Pointing out failings, like a poorly designed traffic pattern at a rest stop, is fair criticism and a justifiable reason to not want to go back, assuming a decision like that needs to be justified in the first place.

I happen to commute. I ride for general transportation. I ride for fitness. I do fully loaded, solo tours in various parts of the country. I ride at all sorts of paces and enjoy something like spending a day cycling the Lehigh Gorge admiring the scenery and having a picnic. Just because someone is critical of a certain event doesn't mean they are critical of it because of the slow pace. I would happily to the event again if it were what I considered a tolerable size.

Sy Reene

We didn’t get back toManhattan until 6 pm. The average speed on my bike computer was 7.7mph – the slowest 42 mile ride I’ve ever done. "

this was your bud's lead in. This sounds that at least a bit that his dissatisfaction was stemming from the pace. At the same time, even with the slow start, clogged rest areas, etc.. I really don't understand how it took 9 hours for your friend to complete.. I rode leisurely, took advantage of a couple rest areas and was done in about 5 hours. I can't imagine what added 4 hours to his time?

leob1

The Astoria Park rest stop is designed to be a pinch point, the idea is to have folks trickle out to keep crowding on the roads as minimal as possible. But with 32k folks riding bikes, you still going to have delays, and crowded spots.
Most of the marshals are good people, good riders that want to help. A few of them sign up to volunteer just so they can do the ride free. If you do other BNY rides, you can pick these guys out easily.

velofinds

Interesting. If I think of it that way, then that momentary bottleneck wasn't unwelcome. I'd rather deal with crowding there than on the road.