MattCycle

I thought it would be interesting to hear everyone's cycling goals for this year, whatever they may be, now that the weather is better, to inspire, motivate, or shame others.

My goal is to take the train to Harpers Ferry and ride back down the Potomac to DC. Depending who you are, it is relatively achievable (60 miles), less than a day of riding, and literally downhill. I'll probably spend the night there, get a coffee or something, and set out in the morning.

jpescatore

Still kinda hard to set any firm goals! My near term target is to do the May 1 Six Pillars century ride out of Cambridge MD on the Eastern Shore. It is tentatively still on, we'll see.

By fall, I'd like to be able to do some form of multiday tour again.

Mileage-wise, last year I got in slightly more than average riding miles in - made up for the lack of organized rides with a lot more time to do shorter local rides.

Altair 4

2021 goals are still in a state of flux. I'm fully vaccinated now so that's dropped my internal stress. Still aiming for a couple of rides in Ontario, but who can say when the border will open? More realistically, I'll probably get a couple of rides on sections of the GAP trail (haven't been on the Connellsville to Confluence section in a while). I'd like to get the wife out on the Cuyahoga Valley trail north of Akron (the Cuyahoga Valley Scenic Railroad is going to start up again) and take advantage of their "Bike Aboard" deal. Beyond that, nothing else really planned, so it'll be "wait and see" what presents itself.

Rooney 

I might as well put this down somewhere so that it's more likely to manifest:

• Do a 50-mile ride and a 100-mile ride by the year's end
  • I did a 33 recently, so the 50 shouldn't be too difficult. I'm still dealing with the lingering effects of a mild concussion from early-February so I need to make sure I don't overwork myself.
• Get in a handful of S24O
  • Haven't done one before, but I'd love to start. Also, seems like a good intro to touring.
• Explore more of South-Eastern PA
  • I moved back home (Philly burbs) during Covid after a few years in NYC. I'm not very familiar with what's around because I didn't ride much until I moved to NYC. Now that it's nice out again, I'll make a trip to the New Hope/Lambertville towpaths and explore them some. I'd also like to check out the Schuylkill River Trail.
• Aim for an average of 3 or 4 days of riding per week*
  • After seeing the improvements I've made during the winter, I'm excited to continue now that the weather's improving. Today's rain is also a reminder some rainwear is necessary if I want to really stick to this goal. *Once I'm back to feeling 100%.
• Ride with friends more
  • I've been diligent about maintaining distance. With the nicer weather though, and vaccinations rolling out, it'd be nice to have one or two friends along on the occasional ride.

I think these are all pretty achievable. I'm not looking to do anything too wild. After spending the last couple of months getting my old Schwinn into better shape, I'm ready to get into a nice riding groove. I think I did a decent job getting out during the fall and winter to be in shape to do some more serious spring/summer riding. Looking forward to the year to come!

jpescatore

My wife and I did a supported multi-day ride on the Delaware and Lehigh Rail Trail from Glen Summit south to New Hope (and a bit further south) - really loved that trail. We had a couple of days of rain on the down side, stayed in hotels on the upside. Very doable without support - the outfit we went with (Pocono Biking) has a shuttle service for self-supported rides. There was one stretch without trail where you were on roads, but that was easy to navigate.

I did a CycleBlaze writeup on that ride here.

balto charlie

I am giving thought to riding Maryland's Eastern shore for a flat easy tour. I hopefully will go out west for many weeks but don't have anything planned. I just canceled a month in Arizona. They relaxed their mask mandates and their Covid cases are high. Decided to travel local for a few more months. I do want to do some gravel bike-packing trips this year. I am thinking the gravel near Charlottesville and Skyline Drive Va would make for great trip. So far nothing in stone, getting my second shot today Once injected I shall plan away. I just did a nice 1 day gravel ride in Michaux State Park, this area is also a nice gravel bike packing area.

TBlackwell600

I've biked most of the C&O in that area and for the most part, it was a nice ride. Flat, with a slight downhill grade, but could get muddy in sections. A lost of $$$ was spent on the C&O over the past few years as part of the coast to coast trail initiative, so you should have a great ride.

TBlackwell600

I'm hoping to do the GAP trail from Pittsburgh, PA to Cumberland, MD this summer. I'm also hoping to bike the Island Line Trail in Burlington, VT.

TBlackwell600

Love the D&L, biked it many times and will be back again. I've always wondered how the road section is from Northampton to Allentown. Is it safe for bikes?

jpescatore

It wasn't that bad from a traffic point of view - there wasn't that much traffic when we did it on a weekday. I'm comfortable road riding, but I don't think this was a scary or dangerous stretch but it is sharing the road with cars/trucks. Traffic was light enough and they seemed to be used to bikes on the road, essentially claiming the lane wasn't a problem.

The bigger issue was the condition of the roads . Several bikes got flats - if you did squeeze to the right, vs. staying on the parts where cars kept the road swept clean, in many sections you were riding through lots of debris.

Thomas15

I rode in the "Ben to the Shore" charity ride in 2019 as a member of one of the largest teams that enters that event every year. 2019 was my first year, did ok 65 miles from Philly to Atlantic City NJ. Total time on the bike was 4 hours, 49 minutes plus 50 minutes off the bike.

They didn't have the event in 2020 so all that pent up energy. My #1 2021 goal is to do better than 3 hours 30 minutes with no stops. I was quite optimistic about this until I received my second C-19 shot which really took the wind out of my sails. But forging ahead, I have 20 weeks to get it back.

In addition to this I want to do an epic climb. Locally (Carbon County PA) I have plenty of hills to practice on but I want to climb either Whiteface Mtn in NY or Spruce Knob WV. I'm also going to do a full century on my Mountain Hybrid bike on the local MUP (the famous D&L Trail).