Dot Bike

September 21st is the city wide bike ride.  There is still plenty of time to get in shape for the 50 miler and to register for the ride either as an individual or as part of a team.  In fact, you can join the DotBike team.

That’s right DotBike is registered as a team!  If you can ride with is, when you register, after agreeing to the waiver choose to “Join a Team” and then select DotBike from the list of teams.

This is a fantastic event that features 10, 30 or 50 miles routes entirely within the City of Boston as well as entertainment and food.  One highlight of the start of all routes is the opportunity to ride on Storrow Drive while it is closed to cars — though I’ve always thought the section right through Dorchester are also a key highlight.

All routes start and end with a festival at Government Center and there are fun stops with snacks and music throughout the ride.  Volunteers along all routes help with traffic.

Check out this video created by a group scouting the ride last week to see some of the scenic highlights.

The second Boston Bike Friday is coming up this Friday.  The weather is forecast to be great.  The DORCHESTER CONVOY starts in Peabody Square. Hope to see you there.

Check out the city’s Boston Bike Friday page and our event listing for more info.

WHAT: SAFE, GUIDED CONVOYS WITH POLICE ESCORT Lead by experienced cyclists and escorted by Boston Police, convoys follow a fixed schedule and route and originate at locations throughout metro-Boston. All convoys finish at City Hall Plaza Boston.

FREE BREAKFAST, BIKE EXPO AND MUSIC Whether you ride in with a convoy or ride along, join us at Boston City Hall for free food and fun, courtesy of 100.7 WZLX, Mass Commute, Mass Bike, and all our sponsors.

The weather was fantastic, the crowds were large and everyone had a great time at the Dorchester Beach Festival this past Saturday.  DotBikers escorted several families from Pope John Paul Park to the festival and a number of bicyclists arrived on their own.  Many festival goers availed themselves of the free valet bike parking and as an added bonus got a free ABC safety check.

We gave away lots of schwag and info and had a lot of interest.   There was definitely much interest in getting the gaps in the Harbor Trail closed with numerous folks wanting to know how they could help move this forward.  We will continue to work with the various agencies involved to push on this and provide updates and suggestions for how you can help.

A big thanks to everyone who helped out at the festival as well as MassBike, the City of Boston and Officer Rorie at District C-11 for providing us with  goodies for the festival.

DotBikers had a fun and successful time at the two neighborhood community events hosted by Representative Marie St. Fleur this past Tuesday and Wednesday.

At the Tuesday event which was held at the St. Peters School on Bowdoin St. five DotBike volunteers were there to answer questions and provide info to the attendees.  But even more fun than working the crowd was the St. Peter’s teen center bike club.

These youth are planning on riding in the Rodman Ride for Kids coming up in late September.  Many of them had bikes that were in need of some repair and not correctly fitted for the rider.  Vivian worked with them, showing them some minor adjustments that they could make to make riding easier and more comfortable.  He and others will continue to work with this group to get them ready for the ride.  We hope to join them on some training rides so stay tuned for upcoming announcements.

At the Wednesday event at Project Hope on Dudley St. we mixed and mingled with the attendees and helped some of them out with minor repairs. Fun was had by all.

Just a reminder to mark your calendars for the upcoming Dorchester Beach Festival happening on August 16th from 11 a.m. - 4 p.m.  Ride to the festival with DotBike.  We’ve added a whole new page with information, links to the festival web site and DotBike activities to the blog so click on the tab above or go directly to the page here.  Come by bike if you can - we’ll provide the parking - and even if you can’t stop by our table and say Hi.

The Tour de France recently concluded with Carlos Sastre of team CSC-Saxo bank winning the final yellow jersey in Paris.  For many people the Tour de France is the only bike race they may have heard of and that is likely due to that guy named Lance who won seven in a row.

However, there is a whole world of bike racing out there at various levels and disciplines and here is just a little taste of where you can go to find out more if you are interested.  I follow road racing so will focus on that but there are Mountain Bike, Cyclocross and BMX specific sites and reports out there if that is your thing.

Most of the teams that race the Tour de France are the top level elite Pro Tour squads (actually there is a question as to whether there is going to be a ‘Pro Tour’ next year - but that is another story).  These are teams like CSC-Saxo bank, Columbia (formerly T-mobile/High road) and Astana.  They have multi-million dollar budgets and consist of about 25 riders whose talents are divided between climbers, sprinters, time trialers, roulers and all-rounders.   These are the major league of cycling.

There is a second level of teams, the pro-continental teams, that have slightly lower budgets and fewer riders but some of these can hang with the big boys and get invites to the Tour due to strength of their results in other high profile European stage races.  Teams such as Garmin-Chipotle and Agritubel.  These are like baseball AAA minor league teams.

However, the vast majority of professional cycling teams in the U.S. and Europe are classified as continental teams.  These teams usually have relatively small budgets and anywhere from 5-15 riders.  They tend to race mostly in their home country but sometimes get a chance to race overseas.  A DotBike member, Adam Myerson, who lives in Fields Corner races on just such a team, Time Pro Cycling.  Time Pro Cycling is in its first year with a professional license and is focused on developing up and coming talent by mentoring young racers with more experienced riders.  Adam (check out his blog here) is one of those more experienced racers and currently he is leading in the USA Criterium Series (which is pretty awesome if you ask me).

Then there are those who like to race for the fun and fitness but don’t make their living by racing.  There are clubs in the area including the Blue Hills Cycling Club who support this type of rider.

Aside from the links to the teams and organizations above there are some great web sites that will allow you to follow lots of bicycle racing at all levels.

There is the VeloNews website with a bit of a focus on american racing, Cycling News based in Australia (I think) which is entirely on line and has pretty comprehensive race coverage and the Bicycling magazine web site which is more of a general bicycling information site but does have some race coverage.

The Mayor and David Watson of MassBike will be speaking in the courtyard at the BU school of communication at 640 Commonwealth Ave. about the new Comm Ave. bike lane, installing bike racks around the city, and one other topic yet to be disclosed.  It’s happening next Tuesday at 11:00 a.m. and it would be really great if a bunch of bicyclists could show up.  See the event listing to the right for more details.

On my ride in this morning I was pleasantly surprised to see that not only was the resurfacing of the section of Perkins St. that goes between the Jamaica Way and Pond Ave. just north of Jamaica pond has been finished, but they’ve painted a bike lane.  This isn’t just a shoulder but actually has bike stencils and arrows that show they really intend it for bikes.

As I was on my way to work and running a bit late I didn’t see how far it went around the pond on the Brookline side - it ends at the rotary to go onto Pond Ave. heading north - but it seemed to keep going.

Now, this is probably technically in Brookline but maybe not and I think it is DCR managed property but whoever is responsible and whereever this is THANK YOU.

The Dorchester Beach Festival is happening on Saturday August 16th from 11-4.

This will be a fun and interesting event for all ages and interests.

DotBike is leading a ride to the festival.  This is a short (4.5 or 3 mile options) and relaxed ride appropriate for children and families.  Most of the ride will be along ‘The Harbor Trail’ on bike paths and low traffic roads.

For the longer ride you can meet us at the southern end of the Neponset Greenway Trail near the intersection of River and Central St. in Milton for a 10:30 departure.  Limited on street parking is available.

For the shorter ride meet us at 10:45 a.m. in Pope John Paul Park near the Hallet St. entrance next to the parking lot.

Here is a map with our ride route highlighted in Green with meet up locations indicated as well as alternate routes to bike to the festival if you are unable to join us on our main ride.

View Larger Map

While you’re enjoying the festival we will have FREE valet bike parking. We will also do some simple bike checks and tune ups and have some fun giveaways.

We will be providing bike escorts from and to Pope John Paul park in case you can’t make it until later or to show you how to get back to where you started. We’ll have someone leaving from Pope John Paul Park to escort riders to the festival at 11:30, 12:30, 1:30 and 2:30 and check at our table to get the times that we are heading back to the Park from the festival.

Hope to see you down at the beach.
And once your ready to go home and aren’t sure if you remember the way back don’t worry. If you can’t arrive at the festival until later we will

Just got to work after the first Boston Bike Friday event put on by the City of Boston Bikes program.  The Dorchester convoy made a strong impression with about 30 riders riding along Dot. Ave and into the Boston city center via Washington St.   This time we had an escort of 6 or 7 Boston Bike Patrol officers who were absolutely great.  They controlled traffic, corked bad intersections and made the ride safe for all.  We had a few people who had never before dared to ride up the Avenue or in the city in general make the trip and they appeared to enjoy themselves.  We made it from Peabody Square to City Hall Plaza in about 35 minutes.  At the plaza were tasty treats and booths from Mass Bike, Ski Market (they sell bikes too), Wheelworks, GoGreenStreets, Hub on Wheels, Zipcar and 100.7 WZLX.

Thanks to the city for having events like these and come join us for the next one Friday August 22nd, same time, same place.