The Tucson Police Department addressed cyclists before the Tuesday Night Bike Ride last night.

Check out the video to see what the officers had to say and watch scenes from the ride.

Most of the cyclists on the ride waited for lights to change and generally followed the laws. The biggest complaint from many of the people on the ride was the lack of regrouping, something they hope is addressed.

What do you think? Were the police reasonable?

Read the other stories about the police involvement with the ride:

• TPD to speak at Tuesday Night Bike Ride
• Police a no-show at Tuesday Night Bike Ride
• TPD to work with cyclists to curb bike ride’s lawlessness
• Fox 11 airs story on Tuesday-night ride
• TPD looking to work with cycling community to calm TNBR
• Police present at Tuesday Night Bike Ride, several cyclists cited

The Arizona Cancer Center starts its 11th year of Better Than Ever training program with an information expo on Wednesday.

According to a press release, the program encourages people to make exercise a regular part of their day and had helped more than 3000 people train for various events while raising more than $1.6 million for women’s cancer research.

The training program for the 40 and 66 mile versions of El Tour de Tucson begin on Sept. 7, 2010.

Marisa Allen, the program’s coordinator, said participants must try to do their best in raising between $100 and $275, but will not have to make up the difference if they don’t raise that much.

Event details: Better Than Ever Kick-Off Event and Expo
What: Learn more about Better Than Ever, meet team leaders and fellow participants and sign up to for the 11th season of the program. Refreshments will be served and raffle prizes will be awarded.
When: Wednesday, Sept. 1. Information session at 5 p.m., presentation begins at 6 p.m.
Where: Arizona Cancer Center’s Kiewit Auditorium, 1515 N. Campbell Ave.
Who: Community members of all abilities interested in getting fit, having fun and fighting cancer
Etc.: Registration is open through Sept. 20.
More Information: Contact Marisa Allen, program coordinator, at mallen@azcc.arizona.edu or (520) 626-7177

Download the Better Than Ever brochure.

The rain and potential police action may have kept some people away from the Tuesday Night Bike Ride — including the police.

Although the police were invited and said they would attend the ride to talk to the group they didn’t show, but between 75-100 cyclists did.

Bike ambassador Colin Holmes and longtime Tuesday night biker Karl Goranowski, who went on some of the original Tuesday rides, addressed the group before the ride.

Holmes and Goranowski asked the group to try to be more respectful of the laws and drivers on the road to avoid having more police intervention in the ride.

Frequent Tuesday night rider Wes Shull said before the ride that he thought the police department’s concerns about drivers having to wait were overblown.

“Yeah we should all share the road, but there are 200 of us and one of them,” Shull said. “They can’t wait a few minutes?”

Goranowski, who led the ride, said he is a pessimist and didn’t think trying to slow the ride down and get riders to obey the laws would work.

Shull said he had mixed feeling about the ride.

In some ways it was better than the last couple times, more controlled, more sane,” Shull said.

The ride was much more reserved and took roads with lower traffic including; Mountain, Blacklidge, Treat and Elm. The overall speeds were much lower and the group waited for riders to catch up when they were caught by a light.

Twice during the ride, most cyclists dismounted at pedestrian signals to walk their bikes across, something Shull said he thought was overkill.

“Yeah, that’s the law, but in a lot of those places there is just no good legal way to get a bunch of people across in one cycle.

Shull said if the goal is to minimize traffic disruption riding across the intersection makes more sense.

Goranowski said he recognizes the ride was slower and the walking across intersections is extreme, but he wanted to make a point that the ride could still be fun when the group slows down and follows the rules.

Shull said he hopes the ride finds a middle ground between total chaos and strict compliance.

“We need to achieve a balance,” Schull said. We over-corrected this time.”

The Tucson Police Department is attempting to work with the bike community to help calm down the Tuesday Night Bike Ride.

In an email to various officials in Pima County and the City of Tucson, TPD office Jerry Skeenes asked for help from the bike community.

There is a mass bike ride that happens late on every Tues night.  A downtown TPD Sgt brought it to my attention last night.  According to the Sgt there are hundreds of  riders involved and it happens at about 9:00 pm on Tuesdays.  They block the streets and completely disregard stop signs and red lights.  I would like to have someone from the bicycle community work with the TPD Sgt.  I thought that maybe someone from the BAC or another group could make contact with the riders and try to educate them before someone is hurt or killed.  We would like to get some type of voluntary compliance from the group as opposed to enforcement.  There are ways the group can get the proper permits and some minimal traffic control so they could safely do their ride if they want to continue doing it the way they are.  Thanks for any help you can provide.

In yet another email from Sheila Foraker, the education director at Perimeter Bicycling Association of America, she requested several Bike Ambassadors attend a meeting with TPD on Monday to help devise a plan.

Hey everyone.  We have been invited to help TPD with improving the safety of a group ride that originates in downtown on Tuesday nights.  The ride is growing and TPD would like to work with us to help ensure the safety of the participants.  TPD is asking for a meeting on this coming Monday, I don’t have a time or location yet,  probably during the day.  We need 8 – 10 Ambassadors that could help with the ride the following evening.

I’ve spoken with Foraker and will add her comments later this evening.

A BMX rider is stopped for not having lights on his bike.

Several cyclists on the Tuesday Night Bike Ride were cited for various infractions including running red lights and stop signs as well as riding without lights.

Erik Ryberg of TucsonBikeLawyer.com suggested in a recent post that there would be an increased police presence because of a recent incident on the ride in which a dog was run over.

The ride which went south on Fourth Avenue, split into two when a large group of riders waited at the stop light at Sixth Street. The ride regrouped just before the highway on Congress, but quickly split up when riders didn’t make the light under the highway, despite people at the start of the ride suggesting the leaders wait often for the back of the ride to catch up.

The ride turned north on Grande Avenue and then east on St. Mary’s Road. The police showed up after the riders passed under the interstate heading east.

Police used their loud speakers to instruct the group to stay in one lane and ride two abreast.

Ryberg said it could be confusing to tell people to stay in one lane while also telling to them to ride two abreast.

TNBR rider, Ellen Fischler said at one point the police said to ride in the bike lane, but there wasn’t a bike lane to ride in.

Farther up, Fischler said an officer sped around the group and started to move right into a BMX rider to try to get him move over.

“It was like they were trying to herd sheep,” Fischler said.

A BMX rider was pulled over by police for riding without lights. He argued that a lot of people were riding without lights, yet he was the only one who had been pulled over.

At Fourth Avenue and Ninth Street, another rider was stopped for running the stop sign at the intersection. The biker got on the multi-use path, but was followed by the officer who followed him by driving on the dirt next to the path.

Ryberg said the police actions were much more subdued than when the police cracked down on the ride two years ago.

Were you on the ride? What did you see and hear? Leave a comment below.

Editor’s note: Fischler, who is quoted in the post, is my sister-in-law.

What: Cactus Cycling Club’s Hills of the Foothills ride

When: Tuesday at 6:15 a.m. (The time moves later as the temperature drops.)

Where: Basha’s parking lot on the southwest corner of Sunrise and Kolb.

The route:

Description: The Cactus Club hills ride features about 10 short but steep hills. The route occasionally changes, but hills are always the focus.

There are several regrouping spots along the route to allow everyone to catch up after the hill.

As a bonus, what goes up must also come down. There is one particular descent that is straight, long and smooth. Without pedaling I reached 48 miles an hour.

The group has coffee and snacks at the end of the ride.

The ride generally isn’t competitive, but you can usually find someone willing to charge up the hills with you.

Check out the video from last week’s ride:



Image from ClickedBMX.com

Local BMX riders are hosting a “jam” on Saturday to show riders who are in town for the American Bicycle Association’s BMX Southwest Nationals what Tucson’s BMX community is all about.

According to Rocky Serna, the creator of Barrio Trails BMX park, the jam starts at 2 p.m. Saturday and will likely go until it gets dark.

Serna said a BMX jam is similar to a music jam session.

“It’s not contest or anything, its literally just a bike party,” Serna said. “It is a bunch of people getting together and having fun.”

Serna said there aren’t very many places for BMX riders to show off their tricks and with the thousands of cyclists in town they want to highlight Barrio Trails.

“It puts us in the national eye,” Serna said. “People come from all around the country to race Southwest Nationals when they are not racing, where do they go? The trails are the spot.”

Serna said the jam is open to anyone and often the riders’ parents will bring their grills, tents and spend the afternoon watching the riders.

Barrio Trails is located south of Park and Broadway at the intersection of Miles Street and Fremont Avenue.

Editor’s note: I’ll start featuring recurring rides every few weeks or so. This week’s ride is the El Grupo Points Race.

What: El Grupo Points Race

When: Thursday at 6:30 a.m.

Where: El Grupo Clubhouse at the southwest corner of 6th Street and 6th Avenue

The route: http://www.gmap-pedometer.com/?r=3888284

Description: The El Grupo Points Race is vastly different than it was when it started as a BICAS Thursday morning fixed ride. The vast majority of riders are on road bikes with gears, but Ignacio Rivera de Rosales, El Grupo’s coach and defacto ride leader, still rides the 21-mile loop fixed.

The ride features several different paced groups who fight to earn points on the four sprints along the route. The rider with the most points at the end of the ride is awarded the coveted lilac 1985 Arizona Road Race Champion’s jersey and defends it the next week.

The ride is open to anyone who wants to attend.

Check out the video from last week’s ride:

Team Colleen, a local non-profit cycling group which focuses on cancer survivors and raising money for cancer research, is teaming up with The Loft Cinema for a showing of “Ride the Divide.”

The film is about the the world’s toughest mountain-bike race, which covers 2,700 miles along the continental divide.

A portion of ticket sales will go to the Team Colleen organization. In addition to the ticket sales, the team will be holding a raffle with prizes from several local businesses.

Check out the event listing on the Loft’s website. Here is the TucsonVelo event listing where you can send the event on your social networks.
Here is the official trailer:

Editor’s note: 14 -year-old Max Cronyn spent the weekend competing at the USA Cycling Junior Nationals in Bend, Ore. This is final update from the races. Thanks for keeping up updated Max.

Today’s race:

The road race was another hard race and I didn’t feel 100 percent this morning.

The line up for the start was the same as yesterday. It was funny because there were 75 of us and the race official tried to get us to move back and we’d take three steps back and then we would all cram back together. We did it like five times before he had move us 30 feet back.

I had pretty poor starting position because I got to the start line a little late. I was probably around 60 of 75 racers
For the first two miles, the race was neutral and no one could attack so that we could get out of town, after that it was a really fast race. It was similar a really hard Cat 3 race. The guys who have a chance at winning any of the races at nationals could hold their own in any Pro 1/2 field and could win most Cat 2 races. It was a really tough field.

I planned to be on the front at the start of the climbs so that I had some room to fall back, but it didn’t go quite as planned. The centerline rule wasn’t in effect so we could take up the entire road. There were pretty much always 10 people across the road, which made it really hard to move up through the pack. I never really moved up.

We hit the first climb, which was about 1.5 miles long. About halfway up , people started getting dropped pretty consistently. Every 15 seconds or so, somebody would get dropped. Pretty soon it was my turn to get dropped and then I rode behind the field for the rest of the race.  I worked with another rider for a little while, but I ended up dropping him.  I finished toward the back of the field. (Editor’s note: Max finished  55th of 66 riders, 12 minutes behind the leaders.)

Looking back:

I would have liked to finish better, but I think it was good to come up to nationals and get beaten. It is kind of tough to go from local races where I can do pretty well and then you come up here and you get your butt handed to you.

Sometimes getting beaten can be motivating. The road race wasn’t terribly motivating, but I was really motivated by the crit because I got better riding in a big field. I want to continue to get better at crits because it suits my size better.

I am glad I am done with nationals for this year. I would do it again next year if we were going to be in the US, but I still want to get better even though I won’t be able to come next year.

The races solidified that I need to get better climbing and riding at the front of a big pack. It is hard to get to the front and then it is really easy to slide back.

I’ve been talking to a lot of people who say the junior nationals is not a huge indicator of who is going to do well in cycling at another time. I just want to keep racing and keep getting better.

It was fun to race with people my own age this weekend, although it makes it harder because when you are racing with a bunch of older guys and you get dropped, you can always say, “Ohh in another 25 years I’ll be able to keep up with you.”  You can’t really say that when you are racing people your own age.

I think the races this weekend helped me get a lot more confident. People go to nationals and come back faster on the bike. I think I am faster now and I think I’ve made a big improvement from last year.

I like to do well and I did better last year, but I liked racing with the 15-16 year-olds because it is a lot more uniform in strength and it is a lot more skilled.

Pre-race meal:

I didn’t feel like eating much this morning, but my mom made me choke down this smoothie that she made. I am not sure what all was in it, but I know it had bananas, milk, peanut butter and chocolate powder.  I also had some Cheerios.

We made our own energy drink for the race today. It had lemon juice, honey and salt mixed with water. It tasted like honey and it was pretty effective.