Again, I apologize for the lack of posts as work has been super busy. But in the meantime, enjoy this clip I found today. It will give you an idea of how exciting it is to ride your bike in the biggest city in America. There's a brief intro and then the fun begins. Enjoy!

Link: http://www.bikemonthnyc.org/

Did you know that May is Bike Month here in New York City? If you ride the subways you will see the ads plastered on the train cars. It's a great initiative to get people out and on their bikes. Bike New York's 5-borough tour, the ride my wife and I did last week was one of the major events. All of this bike talk reminds me of what my favorite NYC ride is.

The most thrilling bike route in Manhattan for me is on 5th Avenue from E. 90th St south to you name it! It was always a way for me to inject some excitement to the end of my ride in Central Park. As some of you know, riding around and around the park can be a bit boring, kind of NASCAR like. So when my ride ends, I exit the park at E. 90th and continue south on 5th. The thrill comes immediately. As I ride past 86th St, I know the transverse is near, meaning a boat load of cars wanting to cut me off. Then comes the Met, ah those tourists. The Met is very challenging in that you never know when a cab will want to pull over to the curb. Couple that with the ubiquitous tour buses and you have the game of Frogger! But that's not it. Do some of these tourists know to look both ways before crossing? Nothing is more embarrassing than crashing, I mean bumping, into a tourist after using your ninja-like reflexes to avoid a few tons of steel!

Okay, so that only gets me to E. 79th St, another transverse, ditto. From there, it's E. 72nd St. This intersection is not too hard because there's no transverse. You do, however, want to avoid those damn buses turning from 72nd and immediately gunning for that bus stop on 5th. But they have the right of way, you say? Duh! Red light = ride faster to avoid the oncoming traffic!

Please wear a helmet.

The ride can go on and on, but I chose to turn off of 5th to head home (no, I don't live on the UES anymore). Plus, you get the picture. And please, safety first. I don't recommend this unless you are a NYC bike messenger.

Do you have a favorite ride in NYC? If so, let's hear about it.

We're back, we did it. In all, we rode for 51 miles today, including the extra miles getting to the start and getting home from the end. I'm too tired to write more. I will update this post later with some images.
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Ok, I'm back. It's been 6 days. My wife and I have fully recovered though we can't commit to when we'll be back on our bikes again. This ride was indeed a personal triumph for us.

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Link: http://www.bikenewyork.org

My wife and I are getting ready to do the 5 borough bike tour here in New York City tomorrow morning (see the link). We've been busy trying get some miles in for the last month. It's been hard, the weather hasn't been as warm as we'd like so we are very short on training. Of course, we've been trying to save the legs as often as possible.

For those of you that aren't familiar with this ride, it is a yearly event that takes ten's of thousands of riders through the closed streets of Manhattan, The Bronx, Queens, Brooklyn and yes, Staten Island. Though, we barely touch The Bronx and Staten Island. It is 42 miles through the canyons of Manhattan, the concrete of the FDR and the steel of some of New York City's most famous bridges. We start in lower Manhattan and travel up 6th Avenue, through Central Park, up into Harlem and over into The Bronx. From there, we return into Manhattan, ride south on the FDR and the cross over into Queens via the Queensboro Bridge. Astoria Park is next where there is a huge festival. Then it's due south through Brooklyn. We travel on the BQE making our way towards the Verrazano Bridge. From there, we cross over into Staten Island where the finish line is.

I'm out of breath, so wish us luck!