The Blog Page

News, commentary and humor about bicycling and other topics of the day

 

Winery ride rainout

I was supposed to lead a Belleville Area Bicycling and Eating Society ride at the Ravissant Winery in Belleville, Ill., today. However, because of the rain, only one person showed up, and I had to cancel the ride. I kind of figured almost no one would show up, but I had to be there anyway in case people did.

While I was disappointed that the ride was cancelled -- the three winery rides we did last fall drew about 25 people each -- I would much rather have the bad weather this weekend instead of next weekend for the Tour de Stooges. A whole lot more is stake with the Tour de Stooges than with the winery ride.

By the way, The Weather Channel is predicting partly cloudy skies with a high temperature of 71 degrees next Saturday for the Tour de Stooges -- and a 0 percent chance of rain! Let's hope that forecast holds true, but you just never know with weather in the St. Louis area.

Roger 1 comments 6:39 PM

Thursday, April 27, 2006

Bicycle racing action in St. Louis

The next two weekends are big ones in the St. Louis bicycle racing community.

This weekend is the 2006 Companion Bakery Tour of St. Louis. The action begins at 8 a.m. Saturday with the Historic Carondelet Park Criterium in St. Louis. It continues with the Greensfelder "Scenic Route" Time Trial at 4 p.m. at Greensfelder County Park in St. Louis County. The time trial includes a 22 percent climb! The final part of the the tour begins at 7 a.m. Sunday, a criterium race in St. Louis' Forest Park.

On May 6, the Velo Force Racing Team puts on the Mills Apple Farm Road Race in Marine, Ill. Racing begins at 9:30 a.m. For more information, you can download this PDF file.

On May 7, the St. Louis Cycling Club puts on the Cougar Criterium at Southern Illinois University Edwardsville. Racing action begins at 8:20 a.m. For more information, you can download this PDF file.

Roger 0 comments 2:47 PM

Swansea to get bicycle trail

The village of Swansea, Ill., will be getting a a new 1.6-mile bicycle trail by the end of this year, the Belleville News-Democrat reports today.

The trail will link Old Collinsville Road with the MetroLink bike trail. Swansea leaders eventually hope to extend the trail to the Shiloh MetroLink station.

Bike trail construction appears to be taking place in spurts in St. Clair County, but it's better than no bike trail construction at all.

Roger 1 comments 9:54 AM

Wednesday, April 26, 2006

Tour de Stooges Zone

My co-workers at the Belleville News-Democrat know the Tour de Stooges is near: They're hearing a lot more Stooge references from me, as they always do when the first Saturday of May approaches. It doesn't help the non-Stooge fans in the newsroom that one of my copy desk colleagues, John Buese, and our executive editor, Jeff Couch, are fans of the Stooges as well.

I have to say I'm excited about the Tour de Stooges. Barring bad weather, we should be well above 500 people for this year's version of the ride. Starting tomorrow, I'll be monitoring the forecast regularly to help me determine how many people McKendree College can expect for the all-you-can-eat brunch buffet after the ride.

With one week left before the online pre-registration deadline, May 3, we already have exceeded last year's online pre-registration numbers!

There's plenty of work left to be done: marking the five routes, buying food for the restaurants, sorting T-shirts, coordinating volunteers, etc.

But I think the work I've put in on this ride since 1997 has been well worth it.

Roger 1 comments 11:13 AM

Saturday, April 22, 2006

Tour de Georgia

For some reason, the Tour de Georgia has slipped under my radar until last night when I perused The Associated Press sports wire and saw a story about the fourth stage of the race. I guess I've been so busy with preparations for the Tour de Stooges that I simply forgot about the race.

At least AP is sending stories about the individual stages to newspaper of our level of service, unlike it did during the Tour of California, when AP didn't send out a story until the end of the final stage. Of course, whether the stories are being published is up to the individual papers.

Fred Rodriguez won the fourth stage of the Tour de Georgia on Friday, and Floyd Landis holds the overall lead. Today, the cyclists make their way up to the top of Brasstown Bald Mountain. You can follow the action at VeloNews.

By the way, I haven't noticed whether the lovely Specialized Angel, Jana Ireton, made her way to Georgia for the race. If she has, that would be a good thing for the racers and spectators!

Roger 1 comments 11:33 AM

Friday, April 21, 2006

Post-Dispatch writes about Richland Creek Greenway

Amanda St. Amand, the St. Louis Post-Dispatch's Illinois columnist, wrote a column Thursday about the Richland Creek Greenway Trail. She took a ride on the the Richland Creek trail -- which goes from North End Park to Third Street in south Belleville -- as well as the MetroBikeLink Trail, which goes from North End Park to Southwestern Illinois College.

It's good to know that Gary Hopfinger, Belleville's parks and recreation director, would like to see the trail eventually make "a giant loop" that would wind along Richland Creek, go toward Eckert's Orchards and end up at SWIC. This year, a modest one-third of a mile will be added to the trail.

Of course, the issue is money. I hope the city of Belleville can get a few lessons from the Madison County Transit District, which developed the extensive network of trails in that county.

St. Amand says that the only problem with the trail is it leaves you wanting more. That's why I usually try to add a loop that includes one of more of these roads -- Green Mount Road, Shiloh Station Road, B Street Road, Shiloh's Railway Street and Illinois Route 161 -- when I do the trail.

Roger 0 comments 12:57 AM

Thursday, April 20, 2006

Five years of Roger Kramer's Favorite Cycling Tours

This week is the fifth anniversary of Roger Kramer's Favorite Cycling Tours being online. It's hard to believe that it's been that long since I created this site.

Here's a little history about the site. During the winter of 2001, I took a class in HTML at Southwestern Illinois College's Granite City campus. I figured I wouldn't hurt for someone in my field -- a newspaper page designer -- to learn a little bit of HTML as more and more people turn to the Internet to get their news.

For the final project, I decided to do a cycling Web site. I had been meaning to find some way to document my cycling adventures ever since a conversation I had with longtime friend Mary Ann Ebner. She asked whether I did a journal of my trips, and my answer was no. Once I took the class, I put two-and-two together and determined a Web site would be the best way to share accounts and photographs of the rides I've done in the United States and Canada.

After I completed the project and got an A in the class, I decided to put it online. It was raw, but it was a Web site. I've deleted the original version of the site, so I can't show you how raw it was.

Also that semester, I took a course in Dreamweaver. That taught me easier ways to further develop the plans I had for the site, and the site that exists now is the product of that. To see the site as it appeared in June 2001 after that Dreamweaver class, visit the Internet Archive Wayback Machine.

As the final project for the Dreamweaver class, I did a Web site for the Tour de Stooges. You can see the results of that class here. You can see the Tour de Stooges site has come a long way since those beginnings.

Later that summer, I developed the Web site for the Belleville Area Bicycling and Eating Society. At the time, members had a difficult time getting up-to-date information about the rides, and I decided that the way to solve that problem was to develop the site. You can see an early version of the BABES site here.

I started the blog portion of the site in February 2004 as a way to provide commentary on various issues both inside and outside cycling. Regular readers of the blog have seen that this page has more or less become a clearninghouse on cycling news. Thanks to Feed Burner, I've been able to add feeds to various cycling sites to this page, and I think that feature makes this page more useful to regular readers of my blog -- especially when during those lulls when I don't post anything original here.

I want to thank all of you regular readers of this site for making in a success beyond my wildest dreams. I'm looking forward to serving the cycling community in the same way for years to come.

Roger 0 comments 10:56 AM

Wednesday, April 12, 2006

Thank God for volunteers

Nothing like a warm, windy day to get the bicycling juices going. We hit the low 80s today, so I went out for a 20-mile ride in the early afternoon.

After that, it was back to work on the Tour de Stooges, which will be Saturday, May 6, at McKendree College in Lebanon, Ill. I drove out to the Lebanon area to make arrangements for the all-you-can-eat buffet at the end of the ride, take a look at some of the roads to make sure there isn't some detour I have to worry about and see Joe Crabtree, who has hosted the final rest stop the past few years on the 30-, 42- and 63-mile routes. It's always a pleasure to see Joe, and he's ready for us!

I suppose I get much of the credit for the success of the ride, but it's really people like Joe who make the ride what it is. Knowing that I have friendly, helpful people at the rest stops makes my job as ride coordinator a whole lot easier. Then, there's Randy Gall of the Troy Knights of Columbus, who has made the Knights' property open to us every single year of the Tour de Stooges. Randy is there bright and early to help me set up the first rest stop, and all he asks for is a T-shirt. I am most willing to oblige.

There's also Dawn Weber, the manager of the Touring Cyclist shop in Belleville. Every year, I help her shop's biathlon at the trickiest intersection of the route, the Illinois 159-Milburn School Road intersection, and she returns the favor by handling the Highland rest stop on Stooges.

While I'm out trying to deal with issues on the course in the morning, Laurie Wild-Schultz helps keeps things moving at registration. Laurie is a tireless volunteer for Gateway Council of Hostelling International, and her job isn't over when registration. She then keeps the films rolling during brunch, again allow me to handle more issues on the course.

I would be amiss if I didn't mention The Cyclery in Edwardsville. The Cyclery has handled sag support for the ride from the beginning. Steve Parks and his crew have always been good to the Tour de Stooges.

Finally, there are the numerous volunteers who handle parking and registration at McKendree. Their job got a lot tougher when nearly 500 people showed up for the ride last year, more than twice as many as in any previous year. We're expecting at least that many this year, and I know they will be up for the task.

We still need a bit of help with this year's ride. I would feel more comfortable if I had another sag driver, and I'm need of people to handle the New Baden rest stop for the 63-mile route. If you're inclined to help, contact me at tourdestooges@rogerkramercycling.org.

Pre-registration is going well, and we're now hoping the weather will cooperate with us. We encourage you to pre-register for the ride -- you get a substantial discount if you do -- and you can do that at the ride's Web site.

Roger 0 comments 11:48 PM

Thursday, April 06, 2006

Lights on in Fairview Heights

The folks at the Touring Cyclist shop in Fairview Heights, Ill., showed some real dedication Wednesday morning.

In the aftermath of Sunday's tornado that killed one person and caused lots of damage in Fairview Heights' business district, the Touring Cyclist couldn't open its doors Monday or Tuesday. Even though the store only minor damage, the area around the store was sealed off because of the major damage to buildings and power lines.

Employees were allowed back in the shop Wednesday. Even though the shop still didn't have power, that didn't stop assistant manager Mike Eschmann from doing some bike repairs. Mike used the light from an open back door and the front windows to do some work.

By Wednesday evening, the shop had its power back and things were gradually returning to normal.

You can read more about how Touring Cyclist and other businesses are coping with the aftermath of the storm at the Belleville News-Democrat. And you can see a photo of Mike at work here.

Roger 0 comments 11:33 AM

Wednesday, April 05, 2006

Speak out on Illinois highway safety

The Illinois Department of Transportation and Division of Traffic Safety have begun the process of developing the Fiscal Year 2007 Highway Safety Plan for the state. Once again IDOT will be hosting a series of public hearings throughout the state for local agencies and the public in a forum that allows everyone to express their concerns about traffic safety issues in their communities.

The Illinois Trail Conservancy is asking for cyclists and pedestrians to put in their two cents worth so that those groups will be represented in the plan. The hearings began April 18 in Pekin and includes a May 2 hearing in Fairview Heights for those of you who live in Southwestern Illinois. You can find a full schedule at IDOT's Web site.

Thanks to Belleville Area Bicycling and Eating Society member Tracy Hall for alerting me to this.

Roger 0 comments 9:31 PM