Pizza Man

Daylight Savings Time is here and you know what that means!!

Yes, the Tuesday night Golden Gate Park group ride/hammer fest/criterium simulation/World Championships will begin again this Tuesday at 6PM, and continue every Tuesday until Daylight Savings Time ends.

We meet on Transverse Drive, just south of JFK drive and we should be pretty easy to spot. We roll out promptly at 6:05 PM and do repeats on a 2.9 mile clockwise loop of Transverse, Middle Drive West, MLK, Chain of Lakes Dr. E., and JFK. There are 2 sprint points per lap, one on the downhill/flat section of Middle Drive W. (the white line painted across the road), and the other at the top of JFK just before turning right on Transverse.

We usually go 1 lap easy, then about 6 to 8 laps hard to extremely hard (about 50-60 min). There will be Primes!! Maybe just a jar of pickles and an unwanted race T-shirt, but hey if it’s a Prime, then it’s worth sprinting for!!

After the hard stuff its usually a nice easy cooldown ride to Ocean Beach and back.

All are welcome (Cat 1 - Cat 5, Men, Women, Juniors, Elites, Masters, etc..), but if this is your first time in a fast race pace group ride you might want to stay near the back for a few laps until you get the hang of the group ride thing.

Hope to see you out there tomorrow!

Sincerely,

Just some guy who heard about this ride from some other guy.

Disclaimers:

No group, club or individual sponsors or promotes this ride, it is just an informal gathering of cyclists that has been happening for many years at the same time every Tuesday night. Riders are not encouraged to break any traffic laws such as speeding or blowing through stop signs and cross walks, but if you are approaching a stop sign or crosswalk and feel the need to hit your breaks, please warn everyone before you hit the breaks by yelling a loud “SLOWING” and try to slow down as gradually as possible.

While no one is in charge here and therefore everyone can do whatever the heck they like, riders in the lead are strongly encouraged to slow down at the bottom of each lap while making the right turns onto Chain of Lakes Drive and JFK so that the group can safely get through this often car traffic congested part of the loop without incident and so that the group may start each hard climb up JFK together.

Thank you and have fun!!


p.s. - Those showing up early often meet at the polo field track for warm up laps.

caloso

Sounds awesome. I really should take half a personal day one of these weeks and drive down for that.

FiveThirteen

Sweeet! See you there.

arexjay

Ditching class for this, wooo.

BlastRadius

daxiang28

game on.

ROJA

I take it this is different from the "Polo Fields" ride?

BBChallenge

Sounds like fun. I'll be there.

- Jeremiah

Pizza Man

Yes. The Polo Fields ride stays on the Polo Fields and was a much smaller group. Now that we've got more daylight a lot more people show up and we take to the streets.

I will still be going to the Polo Field on Thursday nights though.

ROJA

Sounds good, but your warning makes me think it could be a little dangerous to do this on a public road? I wouldn't want someone to hit me from behind because he's drafting off me and I stop for a stop sign or yield to a pedestrian in a crosswalk. What is the general vibe? If you communicate you will be fine? This does sound like a ton of fun and I appreciate the invitation!

arexjay

Man, everybody got strung out on those few turns before the MLK uphill and I got caught near the back, a gap formed, and I just couldn't bridge. Seems like it would've been a fun ride had I stayed mid-pack.

daxiang28

ouch.

Pizza Man

That happened to me too when I first joined this ride in 2005. Eventually I just waited at the top like many others do for the group to come around again. It's much easier to stay with the group after resting a few minutes.

arexjay

I just decided to push myself around for another 35 minutes, never thought about waiting up, hah. This seems like a great way to kick my legs into shape, pace is definitely faster than the 23 mph avg. CAT 5 crits. I'll definitely be skipping more Tuesday night classes for this! And maybe some Port of Oakland, too.

BlastRadius

Hey arexjay, which guy were you? I was on the Bianchi.

I gotta gassed the second lap 2/3 of the way up MLK. 23+ MPH uphill is a recipe for ouch for sure.

arexjay

I was the other guy on the Bianchi. I think I was with you on that second lap, we both lost it around the same time. I kept hammering at around 21-22 mph to the top, and then realized I was too gassed to keep at trying to bridge.

BBChallenge

Yeah, I got shelled pretty quick too. I'm just getting back in to riding after a four years off the bike and last night was an eye opener. I've found I can still ride long distances, but my race legs are long gone! Anyway, I'll definitely be out next week and will get a little more warmed up before starting the ride. Cheers.

BlastRadius

Hey Jeremiah, I remember your ASU shorts. Welcome to the forums.

Ty.S

Well I was looking forward to this until my knee decided to be lame. I'd like to get up and at least see it, and grab some pics.

daxiang28

Weather looks like crap... but just seeing if anybody is heading out there tonight.

Pizza Man

I'm taking tonight off since the weather looks bad and I ned to recover from too many races.
I plan to ride Wednesday night though. I'll be at the polo fields around 5:30, but probably ride to the presidio for a few hills.

BottleRocket

So you, Dave and Ryan weren't there tonight and I finally am able to do the whole hour without cheating or skipping a lap. Hmmmm...........

Pizza Man

Stupid weather report forecast heavy rain from 6 to 8, so I worked later and didn't get in a ride. It looks like it didn't even rain this evening.