The NYC Five Boro Bike Tour: Third Time's a Charm

Yesterday, my son and I again rode in the NYC Five Boro Bike Tour. This father-son family tradition began in 2009 when Eli was just 9 years old. That year, we braved Biblical rains as we passed countless middle-aged riders pushing bikes up hills and taking advantage of the bail-out option at mile 25. "No stopping," he said at the time. Now that he's 12, a few things have changed. For one, he's using an actual geared bike (with 3 chain rings!) - we look for creature comforts as we age, don't we? 

In this, the tour's 35th year, 32,000 riders again descended on the city in search of adventure. This event, while thrilling for many, was becoming known as the "Five Boro Bike Walk," so drastic measures were necessary. This time, the organizers chose to send out starters in three waves rather than just one. As a result, we experienced absolutely no bicycle traffic along the way, even at the typical bottle necks.

Eli, or "Squeaky Magee" as he came to call himself, was riding his mother's Trek mountain bike which could have done with a little additional lube. We saw lots of commuter bikes, many with rusty chains and some with odd modifications, like the rear rack-mounted handlebar bag that I could not quite figure out or the full suspension mountain bike with the high rise handlebars. I also saw a few old Detours bags here and there, but never when I seemed to have ready access to my camera, so I have no pictures to share. None of these bags was as cool as the two I was sporting that day anyway. My Sodo handlebar bag has really grown on me as a place to store food, gear and gadgets all within easy reach.

One of my son's many great qualities is his determination to stick with something once he's started. He was very happy, for instance, to find out that we did not need to stop at the first or second rest areas. Why waste time, he reckoned? This steady forward motion enabled us establish a new family record with a sub-4 hour finish. Done before noon? What do we do with ourselves?

The final 3-mile stretch from the festival to the Staten Island ferry was predictably relaxing up until the final 1/4 mile when the two of us became separated as riders started funneling into the ferry staging area. Images of 19th century steerage popped into my mind and I may have been humming the theme to Titanic as I weaved through the crowds looking for my son. As luck would have it, we found each other before too long, but he is now using this as leverage to get a cell phone. Can't really argue with him there.

Here'a time-elapsed video of the entire tour in under two minutes.

Next up: A return to randonneuring with the Princeton 300K this Saturday.

The NYC Five Boro Bike Tour

I swore I would never do it again. The last time I rode in the annual NYC Five Boro Bike Tour, I decided that I stood a better chance on the open streets of NYC, playing chicken with cabs than trying to dodge the swerving riders who were a little rusty around the edges. Then my son changed all that. This year, I had one of the most exceptional rides I can remember because not only was it a hell of a lot of fun, but I discovered that my son is superman.

When I first proposed the ride to Eli back in March after receiving a flier in the mail, he instantly said, “sure – let’s do it.” He had just signed up for the Team Get Outdoors bike challenge and had fire in his eyes about logging in long miles. He had not yet ridden more than 10 miles at one time, but hey, how bad could it be, dad, we get to takes breaks, right?

Now training wasn’t exactly what I’d call methodical. In fact, it was tough to get out for more than 10 miles at a time together in the weeks leading up to the big ride. He found the rolling hills on Block Island to be somewhat daunting. I looked at his little circus bike the week before the big day and I began to think this might not have been the best idea after all. Since the 5 Boro route is a fairly tight loop and riders are never too far from a subway stop, it seemed like we had plenty of options if things should turn south. In fact, I had my eyes on the Brooklyn Bridge bailout at mile 25 as a real likely scenario.

My in-laws' apartment in Tribeca provides the perfect staging ground for this ride. We could wake up at a leisurely 7:00 and still get to the start in plenty of time. We filled our bottles, quickly dressed and brought the bikes to street level by elevator and headed out for our two mile ride to the start. The mass start of this event is well-orchestrated but the wait is a killer. After 45 minutes of waiting we rode off into the horizon. The atmosphere was pleasant and festive with riders passing beach balls across the avenue to kill time. The weather was dreadful, though, and it rained all day.

After we rolled out, we easily settled into a comfortable pace as we rode quickly through the Village and Chelsea on our way to Central Park. The absolute best thing about this ride is that the streets of NYC are closed to traffic for the full 42 miles. It’s simply magical to ride through one of the world’s major cities with 30,000 other cyclists. There’s nothing quite like it and the magic worked its spell on Eli.

The park itself was less pleasant than the preceding section because of the bottlenecks that the narrower streets caused. This was to be a recurring drawback on the ride. Due to the huge size of the field, whenever the road narrowed significantly, we were forced to walk our bikes like drivers in bumper to bumper traffic on the Long Island Expressway. This was especially challenging when soaked to the bone and chilled later in the ride. After exiting the park into Harlem, we hopped across the Madison Avenue bridge for a short 3 block foray into the Bronx and the headed south over the Third Avenue Bridge to the FDR drive.

The first official rest stop came at mile 15 at a school off the FDR drive at 116th street. Eli and I stopped to pick up a few energy bars and some water and use the porta potties. The FDR Drive down the east side of Manhattan was a major highlight of the ride. The large southbound lane was closed and we were able to take in the impressive vistas as we travelled downtown. Especially welcome was the tunnel under the UN and Tudor City which provided relieve from the rain. It was also exhilarating to yell and screech in a tunnel with hundreds of other cyclists. As we headed downtown, the route crossed the East River at the Queensboro Bridge. The bridge was a bit crowded which led to a delay at the entrance but the views were cool as was the ironwork and drop netting to protect vehicles from flaling debrius. The second rest area came at mile 18 in Astoria.

After riding through Brooklyn for a bit, we were presented with the 25-mile short cut crossing the Brooklyn Bridge back to Lower Manhattan. It was an option many riders were exercising. When I presented this option to Eli, he said, “What are you kidding me? And miss Staten Island?” We pedaled on with determination. The Brooklyn Queens Expressway was fairly pleasant, but also beset by lane closures that resulted in bottle necks and walking our bikes in the pouring rain. There were a few grades on the BQE and I was amazed to watch seemingly healthy adults walking their bikes. No mechanicals, just the result of exhaustion. Not Eli, though, he just kept on pedaling throughout the event. Eventually we made it to the base of the mighty Verrazano-Narrows Bridge. This was actually a pretty big hill. At one point, Eli slowed to the point where it became hard for him to sustain his forward momentum and we walked a bit. I pointed out to him that if I pushed him a bit it would be easier to pedal that to walk. He gave it a shot and rode the rest of the climb. After the crest, we both cruised down to the bottom where the festival awaited.

The festival is a bit of a tease, because after we reached it, there was still a 3-mile victory ride to the ferry launch where we met our ride home to Battery Park. The wait was about 20 minutes in the cold wet air, but the boat ride itself was warm and delicious. We disembarked in lower Manhattan like our ancestors before us only with this time with bikes. A short pedal up to Tribeca and we were home to family and a warm shower.

A few great Eli quotes from the road:

• “Once you’re’ wet, you can’t really get much wetter.”
• “Why do we keep stopping at the rest areas Dad, let’s keep going.”
• “This is so much fun. I can’t believe we’re doing this. I can’t believe how much fun this is.”
• “We never do anything like this, just the two of us.”
• “Let’s do this every year.”

What amazed me most about Eli’s performance is his absolute consistency and stamina. Pedaling away on that little circus bike, he never once suggested we bail out, turn back or even modify our goal in any way. He was like the Energizer Bunny banging that drum all the way to Staten Island.

Unlike the trophy Eli gets for simply showing up in his soccer league, he EARNED the right to feel immensely proud of his accomplishment. Other people were quitting. Grown-ups were walking their bikes. He hammered up the huge grade on the Verrazano-Narrows Bridge. At one point, we saw a young boy on a road bike and in that moment I saw some very exciting possibilities unfold for my son and me in the future.

What was I like as a nine year old? Would it ever have occurred to me to ride 46 miles on my bike? Doubtful. For me, that came later. For now, Eli is superman and I am in awe.

A Chip off the Old Block

I went for two rides yesterday; one was uneventful and the other I hope to remember for the rest of my life. Every Sunday, after dropping my son off at Hebrew school, I hop on my bike, lay down a 32-mile loop and generally screech into the parking lot just as class is letting out. It’s a lovely loop, actually, full of rollers throughout the foothills of the Catskill Mountains in and around the town of Woodstock, NY. Today, however, rather than throw the bike in the car and head back home; Eli and I had planned the inaugural ride in his new endurance cycling challenge.

As I mentioned in an earlier post, we recently learned of a new endurance cycling challenge designed for kids aged 9-20 sponsored by a group named Team Get Outdoors (TGO) located in (where else?) Boulder, CO. Eli was all over it from the beginning. With the weather making a turn for the better, we decided to dust the cobwebs off his bike and ride for 10 ten miles along the beautiful Ashokan Reservoir on Sunday afternoon. The day was warm and sunny, with temps in the mid-50s, which stands in stark contrast to the weather we’ve been experiencing the past few months. We could not have asked for a nicer day to begin our journey.

The Ashokan Reservoir is an engineering marvel started in 1915 to supply fresh mountain water to New York City faucets. It contains over 122.9 billion gallons of water, is 190 feet deep at the deepest point, spans 8,300 acres and covers at least six former towns that were drowned or relocated so that New Yorkers could drink fresh water. Along the banks, there is a short bike trail and a closed-off service road that together stretch about 2.5 miles providing unobstructed views of the high Catskill peaks. It’s “mud season” now, yet there is still snow on the hilltops.

In the driveway this morning, after pulling Eli’s bike out of the shed, we raised the seat, oiled the chain and inflated the tires. We were set to go. After classes let out and we picked up a quick bite to eat and a warm coffee for dad, we unloaded our bikes at the reservoir parking area and took off along the paved bikeway. I was impressed from the beginning how much stronger my son is on the bike this season. Gone are the tiny legs and whiny complaints. As we pedaled along at speeds that ranged from 10-18 miles per hour, I could see the cycling peer inside him beginning to emerge.

As on most long rides, our conversation jumped from cycling to family to all sorts of other random things. At one point, Eli observed that cycling is so great because it is three things in one:

1. Energy-efficient transportation
2. Great exercise
3. Fun

The Ashokan Reservoir is also a Bald Eagle nesting area. In 44 years, I’ve never seen a Bald Eagle that wasn’t in a zoo, a TV commercial or on some form of currency. This day was going to be different. As Eli and I climbed a short grade among a tall stand of pines, we saw a small group of people looking skyward. We glanced up to see a majestic adult eagle looking out across the water from the top of a tall dead tree. It took our breath away.

After seeing the eagle, Eli added a fourth reason to his list:

4. Biking is an amazing way to see the world around you.

In all, we did two laps of the bikeway totaling 11 miles. We rested a few times, watched the eagle on three of our passes and dined on Clif bars and water. Children in the 9-11 year age group, like Eli, need to log rides of at least 10 miles to qualify. Older children must ride longer. When we got home, Eli was relentless in his desire to complete the TGO registration forms and submit today’s mileage.

As Eli and I talked about the exciting rides that lie ahead, my 12-year old daughter Izzy popped her head into the room to announce that, “EVERYTHING THAT HAS ANYTHING TO DO WITH A BICYCLE IS STUPID. I CAN’T BELIEVE HE HAS YOU BRAINWASHED!” Oh well, one out of two ain’t bad. She has her own countless gifts. They just don’t involve bicycles.

Next time we’ll shoot for 20 miles. In addition, we’re working on handling skills like holding a line and braking quickly so we can take this activity onto the open roads. I’ll always remember the look in Eli’s eyes as he looked over to me and said out of the blue, “I’m so lucky I’m your son. You can teach me how to bike like a pro.” Whether or not the last part is true, he sure set the bar high for me as I hope the bike challenge has for him.