Tim Johnson's Ride On Washington: Come Ride With US!!!! HOLD THIS DATE!

[Dirt]

More details will follow on this. I just want to get people thinking about taking part of a day off... or even just a long lunch break to join us.

TUESDAY, MARCH 20, 2012

I'm not talking about riding the whole thing... but just the last day... or just PART of the last day.

Last day will be Baltimore to DC. The route is about 50 miles of rolling hills. Things move along at a fairly spirited clip for the first 35 miles of that.

But what we'd REALLY like is to get a good group of people to join us for the last part of it... Between College Park and the Capitol. We'll publish the exact route we're taking and a pretty good guestimate of when we'll be where. The plan is to pick up people along the way and get a nice, huge group of riders for the last few miles. We'll pass many CaBi stations, so some folks can grab a bike and join us.

This section of the ride will be casually paced. Tim might have to jump ahead to do some schmoozing at the end, but there will be guides and other riders to lead the whole group in, so we lose no-one (Like we did last year when Tim was late for an ESPN interview and wound up conducting it on his cell phone while flying through the city at 18+mph with the rest of us chasing like crazy.)

At the end of the ride we'll have a big gathering with a bunch of riders and cyclists. Festivities are in the works.... as is the exact location of the final arrival point. We'll have all that info finalized soon.

This was by far the funnest part of the ride last year. Please mark that date on our calendar and come out and welcome us to DC!!!! I'll post up more details when I've got them!!!

http://rideonwashington.org/

[Tim Kelley]

The BikeArlington team will be attending the National Bike Summit (which is what this ride is in conjunction with) and we've been kicking around the idea of doing the ride in from Baltimore too. Looking forward to it--thanks for getting the word out, Pete!

[DaveK]

Would love to if I can swing it... maybe I'll just take the day off to come ride with you guys.

[Arlingtonrider]

I'll plan on joining you somewhere!

[eminva]

I will also join you somewhere. I will also make a donation whenever I next sit down and attend to my personal finances (same for you for the Climate Ride, Zanna!).

I looked at the Tim Johnson Facebook page and saw those cool bike bumper stickers -- do I get one of those? It seems I may grow old waiting for the Rapha Festive 500 patch, so I need some shiny thing . . .

Liz

[Greenbelt]

Marked it on the calendar. I'll try to spread the word in the College Park area and along the route (Greenbelt, Hyattsville, Catholic U...)

[Dirt]

I should have some brochures from Bikes Belong in a few days. I'm going to do some kind of pre-ride event at both FreshBikes in Arlington and hopefully Proteus (I'll show up at a Thursday Potluck and talk up the ride a bit).

Liz, I'm pretty sure I'll get a couple of those stickers from Victory Circle Graphics. I'll save one (or two) for you.

Lots more specific information will be coming soon. I'm gonna go scout some stuff early this afternoon.

Thanks y'all for your donations!!!! (@Zanna: I'll get you for the Climate Change Ride too!!! I wish I could do that one... It is a fun ride, but I just don't have the time off.)

Pete

[vvill]

Sounds great - I think I should be able to make it.

[Dirt]

Looks like we've got a pre-ride event set up with Proteus (Details forthcoming).

I've got one more evening pre-ride event in the works on the NOVA side. Nailing that down soon.

Thanks y'all for your support and for joining in.

[Greenbelt]

Dirt, our shop ride yesterday took a route that highlighted some of the DC bike infrastructure: Anacostia tributary trails, Met Branch trail, R street crosstown bike lane (westbound only, Zanna), 15th Street cycletrack, and Penn. Ave bike lanes to get to the Mall area. Here are some video clips: