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Road, MTB — Greek Peak, &c

As the ’97 season approaches, we must sketch out the calendar and get psyched.

Tuesday night rides will begin the first Tuesday of April. All rides will start at 6:00pm at the Marine Midland Bank opposite East Hill Plaza. For the month of April they will be rides — not races, and not fast. We want to give everyone a chance to slowly work themselves into shape and get to know each other in a non-competitive situation where the main focus is on helping and supporting each other as we face the stressful realities of how fat and out of shape we all got over the winter. In May, the Tuesday night rides will include some yellow diamond sessions for those who want to get some more speed, and by the final Tuesday of May we should be racing again. This should get us ready for the ESG qualifiers which are in early June (1st or 2nd Sunday in June)

Thursday night Time Trials will start in the middle of May depending on how the weather treats us. At this time, there are no plans to change anything. We’ll see how Coddington Road holds up under the stresses of spring thaws. So plan on 6:00PM Thursday evenings at the Coddington Rd Community Center for 10 mi. TT’s.

Mountain bike races —Beginning in June (after the trails have dried out somewhat) there will be mountain bike races one night each week on Mount Pleasant. The night will be Wednesday or Friday, depending on the night chosen by Jim Belknap for his series in East Freetown. If you have strong views about when or how we should run these events, please let me (Glenn Swan) know. If you want to take responsibility for running them, please step forward. We always need more help.

The Virgil Road Race, our annual spring road race is in the competent hands of Mike Dolenga and Don Andersen. The date is Mother’s Day, which is Sunday May 11 this year. We already have permission from Bruce Hollenbeck to stage the race from Hollenbeck’s Cider Mill in the center of Virgil. Look forward to more yummy baked goods after the race.

Pre-Season Results — Sunday, Feb. 16 we had a "short notice" mountain bike race. A hundred people had had such a good time at the previous weekend’s Tag Team Battle Bowl over in East Freetown, (a Jim Belknap annual production) that we decided to give people a second chance to play in the snow. We had only 15–18 people show up, but it was enough to have a good time, and few enough that there was enough food to really pig out afterwards. The course was a 3–4 minute loop on packed snow with one frozen pond crossing. It was all rideable, with some pretty fast sections, and some challenging corners requiring a careful line to stay in the fast groove. Adam Gutchess was the class of the field, riding with power and smoothness. There were a few Cornell riders who showed some pre-season fitness. Tana Williams was the lone woman.

Glenn Swan VP Mtn Biking FLCC