cool ride a little smaller(if you can 600 riders that) than rides I’ve been on but just as fun.

Hey guys,

Fun ride. Great pace. Good turnout.

And even though I was only with it enough to catch one, I liked the posted turn signs. Good lookin’ out.

Cheers,
Danny

This should be called the ‘no drama’ ride. Though we were small in size we were big in energy and positivity. (Okay, we did cause a bit of a cluster f*ck on Coyote Road, but it was brief).

I was in the front of the ride on Coyote Road where I hit a pot hole and got two flat tires, and in the process of fixing them I got to see hundreds of bikes pass by, with tons of people on all different kinds of bikes offering to lend a hand. Everyone was having a great time. The rides to and from downtown were a lot of fun, too.

There’s a short news article on the velodrome pre-party from KTVU: http://www.foxreno.com/news/21684402/detail.html

Bike Party!

We were also on TV last night: http://www.ktvu.com/news/21684402/detail.html

Last night’s ride was wonderful!!! I watched the storm all day, and was debating all the way to 6:30 whether to drive to the start with the fenderless Gordon 10-speed, ride my fendered ‘69 Raleigh 3-speed, or ride the Gordon from home (near SCU). I chose to ride fenderless and it was the best choice by far!

The roads were a bit wet but there weren’t any puddles. The wind died down at sunset and the temperature was nippy, but long johns and a sweater provided a very comfortable ride. that’s one lesson I learned from my nights of amateur astronomy: overdress! You can always take it off if necessary.

Another lesson from that activity: go out anyway. What’s the worst that can happen? the best that can happen is that the weather clears and you get very clear skies and a magically, clean and fresh atmosphere just like it was last night.

The ride itself was every bit as fun as all the others I’ve done with the SJBP. I loved the confusion at the circle. Bikes love to party on parking structures! It’s like birds and power lines. The music was mostly hip-hop this time, which worked really well with the rhythms of cycling.

The only bump in my night’s ride was when I collided with a young lady. Apparently she dropped her water bottle right when her pants leg caught in her chaincuard. I was the bottle, but when I looked up she was standing stopped right there! My front wheel jammed between her left side crank arm and the frame as I lurched to a standing halt, and fortunately everyone behind me avoided the snarl. She was very appologetic as I freed my wheel, no harm was done and we continued on.

Excellent ride! I joined up with the group heading back to downtown as we rode through Willow Glen, then up to the end of Lincoln, left on Park and I was home before midnight. Aaaaahhhhhhhhhh!!!!! Bike gets a wiping down in the sun today. 8^)

One other comment. The headlight I was using last night was just about the brightest on the ride. I was told a few times by riders I approached from behind that they thought it was a car behind them. And that was on the “medium” setting! On high it’s plenty of light to see what’s on the road ahead, even wet roads like last night.

It’s the Magicshine MJ-808 headlight with a P-7 LED emitter in it that’s rated at 900 lumens. Although I personally measured the output to be only 375 lumens, it’s BRIGHT! At $85, it’s easily the most lumens per dollar available. And the small battery gives it 3 hours runtime on “high”.
Here’s a link: http://www.geomangear.com/index.php?main_page=product_info&products_id=138

I’m not related to this product in any way, I just want to pass the info along for others looking for a ton of light for a very reasonable price.

very small ride this time.

but, it was all good.

shorter ride this time.

but, it was all good.

saw the usual bike party og’s. missed the abundance of bike party bettys. but, it was all good.

nice ride. see you guys next month.

It turned out the weather got better… too bad more people didn’t treat this as going snowboarding and just put on thin boarding pants and jackets on. It was perfect fall biking weather.

The ride was shortened due to weather conditions that were being given Tues/Wed….some wished it were longer.

But riders were given options to join a pre-ride, so it was cool to see so many join the pre-rides and post rides.

A few saw the BIRDs patch and were giving comments about the rides. My response was to say “thanks” and to invite them to join a “test ride” and/or get more involved in another way to make it their ride too. Everyone is invited on these… rider feedback is always put into the ride.

that fog covering sj was pretty sweet, and it especilaly didnt hit till later in the night.

did we end early or something?

I would wager that if we do a year over year comparison of the numbers, we would find that SJBP growth numbers remain consistently high.
To do month over month comparisons is not a fair representation because October was so much warmer and more conducive to outstanding bicycling conditions and daylight savings time was still in effect.
So lets keep the Party going with the knowledge that the holiday season is upon us and that many of our brethren go into hibernation at the slightest hint of rain and cold.
However, for the rest of us, it is time to refill the punch bowl and keep the PARTY in over-drive.

Bike Party forever!

Another great ride.

The pre-party at Hellyer rocked! Can we do that again next month?

The ride itself was good as always. A surprisingly high turnout given the wet roads and cold mist. (When I got home, I was simultaneously hot from the exercise and freezing from the weather.)

I congratulate the planners for finding a route without a single liquor store. We still had a few douche bags, though. One BMX-rider thought it was funny to knock over traffic cones. Another douche bag threw his empty beer can into the bed of a parked pickup. (A few minutes later, the same douche bag took a spill. Good job, karma!)

Now to wash my bike.

man last night was AWESOME!

Rain or shine it’s San Jose Bike Party time!

BIKE PARTY

I missed last night’s ride after deciding to go to a sharks game.

I think the weather made people chicken out on the ride. I’ll be there for december!

great ride and a great night, the route was “Deep South” and it was good to see those areas of town you never even knew existed, not really that cold outside once you start pedaling, the roads were not too slick either but some areas were really dark (I need a better front light for sure), Sharks game on the speakers(of course they won!), and the smaller number of riders made the ride move quickly, I did have one problem…why was the front page of the bike party site so dang confusing just before the ride? There was way too much info on there about what was going on before the ride or where or whatever. Maybe the ride shoulda just started at the Velodrome….

Great ride! It reminded me of my very first bike party last year. The smaller crowd is kinda nice: fewer slow-downs and more of a community feel. Saw a lot of familiar faces and it was nice to catch up with people.

Also: Pre-rides are fabulous! This was my first time going on one, and it beats having to cram into a crowded lightrail car. Good way to meet people too.

I had a blast! It was my first time out with Bike Party. I had heard so much about it and was really looking forward to it, and it did not disappoint. It was worth taking the night off work! I will definitely be there again next month.
Thanks for putting it all together,
Indiana AL
KRTY Radio
7pm to midnight
(SMOKES AND SPOKES)

@asb jones and everyone else:

This ride was initially going to go even “Deeper South.” It was shortened last minute due to potential rain. The test ride crew put a few hundred miles into riding south side streets and this route had many different versions. There are some interesting things in the Deep South of San Jose and hopefully we’ll all see them on a future ride (we’ll need warmer weather to ride that far out).

This route did kick some serious ass and at the end of night it felt great to have gone at a quicker pace through the brisk autumn air.

And as far as pre/post rides: we took a longer, less direct route back to downtown instead of taking the fast route back (almaden expressway). It was like an after party: we went through downtown willow glen, all the cool older houses in the bird/virginia area, and up first street into the SoFA district and nightclub scene. I’m thinking pre and post rides should incorporate stuff like this more often, if there’s enough time to get where we’re going in the process.

I heard everyone ride by at 9:30ish and I felt a little sad that I wasn’t part of it. It looked like SO MUCH FUN!

It’s every bit as fun as it sounds!!! Riding at night with music in the air is bike dancing. Not the same as music in an earplug.

Any good dancing music will be great when bike dancing. It’s a rave. It’s a disco thing baby. It’s a headbanger thing dude. And it’s a hiphop thang. Hopefully not all in the same place!

It was my first bike party and I was pleasantly suprised. I had been trying to get a few of my riding freinds to come along but they all poo pood it as a rowdy crowd that did nothing to help biking. I have to disagree. Although different from the weekend testosterone crowd it was a celebration of the bicycle in a much more social setting. Where else would you see a 5 year old riding on the pegs of her fathers BMX bike all the while talking to each other. A bit dangerous without a helmet (hopefully she didn’t have to do the whole ride standing up) but they were having quality family time.

Thanks to the organizers of this event. I had a wonderful time and look forward to taking my son on the tandem when it gets a little warmer.

A few suggestions.

It seemed the tone of the ride changed a little for the worse after the long intermission. It only takes a few drunk or stoned individuals to standout and give the ride a bad rap by yelling “Get out of your car and ride a bike you asshole” to people in cars. If they would smile and say “Hi” it would probably want to make those people join the party rather than scorn it. Hopefully in the future we get get those people to practice TOLERANCE and we as cyclist will get it in return.

Enjoy the ride!

Excellent job everyone, (except the very few who were not sharing the road equally with the big metal boxes or acting like fools), that was a great “short, quick” ride through the beautiful So. S.J. area. I was a little saddened that the ride was shortened from the test ride I was on but was overjoyed that the weather was nearly perfect. Kudos to the crew who put this ride together and all the hard-core riders who didn’t let Mother Nature tell them not to go out and play. I can’t wait for the next ride!

Had a great ride on Friday night. Too bad that we did not have more people show up. The weather was not too bad. The test rides were fun too, I plan on catching more of them in the future. They are smaller but have some great people attending. We need more rock and roll! I will try to provide some on the next ride. Sorry but I am an old school classic rocker. :~\

Rock on bike party! Rock till you drop!

In response to First Timer, there’s nothing “dangerous” about a 5 year old riding on the pegs with her father on a ride like this. You’re suffering from an infection of the helmet meme. Bicycling is a very safe thing to do. Helmets do nothing to prevent accidents. Helmets are not necessary for this ride, despite the recommendation of the organizer.

Also, there’s a huge difference between being drunk and being “stoned” (assuming you’re referring to reefer). “Stoned” people don’t get belligerant, drunks do. “Stoned” people can balance on a bike, drunk people can’t. “Stoned” people get peaceful and quiet, drunk people want to fight and get loud. Alcohol kills thousands upon thousands every year, marijuana’s never killed ANYONE. It’s a simple matter of the properties of the individual substances. Please don’t lump them all together.

fun times in the cold!

high-light of the night for me was the pre-party at hellyer park velodrome. 1st time there and loved every freezing moment of it! haha. i’m looking forward to the 2010 races!

glad to see signs posted on where to turn – much better than the once tried chalk drawings. helped a lot. a little bummed about the route changing from hellyer ave to coyote. however coyote was a fun alternative!

hmmmm silver creek valley hasn’t been explored yet… just puttin’ it out there =)

Rapid Robert.

I don’t want to argue a point on this venue so it would be good to discuss our different viewpoints on a later ride. After all diffferences are what open our eyes to what is out there.

In referening to stoned I lumped all chemicals/drugs under one label because I am ignorant of the effect of each and every one. I don’t disagree that everybody has a choice. I only disagree when the choice an individual makes has an effect on others around them without the other having any input.

On the helmet thing. I disagree with the law requiring helmets for minors unless they are distributed freely to the masses but being an engineer and understanding physics. The damping a helmet provides should you or somebody else make a mistake (see my comments in previous paragraph) could prevent a vary tragic accident. It does not take a very fast head velocity to cause brain damage to a human brain (maybe that is part of my problem (3 cracked helmets)). A slim possiblity but one none the less.

See you out there.

A few of us were wondering: now that it’s colder and the numbers are fewer (though i’m sure it will be more than 600 next time) and there are multiple start spots, can we start getting a little more advanced notice of the route? or at least the start/end spot locations? for some people, they need to be able to plan ahead to get to bike party, and/or they decide whether to go or not based on where the start/end spots are. hopefully 96 hour or more advance notice would be doable.

i for one was glad the route was shorter than usual. good call. and although the route (except near coyote creek) was not interesting (and there were no “dense/urban” neighborhoods to check out, contrary to the website claim), at least we exposed residents of new places to bike party, which is good.

thank you for all the work you put into this. if there were more “bike party organizer tip jar”s at various spots, i think you’d get more donations.

Finally got my pictures up … not so many as last month. Was struggling with a lack of light! But here they are:

http://garote.livejournal.com/173138.html

Dear Rapit Robert,

There is absolutely something dangerous about a 5 year old riding a bicyle without a helmet. It doesn’t take much to cause brain damage-especially to a developing brain.

Most deaths on bicycles are due to not wearing a helmet.

As an adult, you have every right to make the decision to kill yourself by not wearing a helmet… but kids aren’t that smart. Thats why its a law.

Read some literature on bicycle deaths and head injuries and then get back to me.

http://www.bhsi.org/stats.htm
http://www.brake.org.uk/facts/why-cycle-helmets-save-lives
http://blogs.consumerreports.org/safety/2006/09/bike_helmets_no.html

@comment#26

Part of the cachet of Bike Party is that you log onto to this site 24 to 48 hours ahead of the start time to obtain start location and route info.

We have all grown used to this process and many of us have reluctantly adjusted to this “ground rule” when it was imposed 6 months, or so, ago and, me think, we should all abide by it,
I think the ride is so much more enjoyable when we all sacrifice equally to participate in Bike Party. This is just me two cents…

@26 tommy, thanks for the feedback, let me give some background and correct some misconceptions that you may have

re: earlier release of info: we’re considering earlier info and tried to get it out earlier but only got it out mid thursday due to changes in route info. we’ll see if we get this out earlier. using mapmyride, creating TxT directions, etc takes a crazy amount of hours to accomplish. for anyone that wants an earlier release I’d suggest two things: (1) attend test rides and (2) step up and help out

re: not interesting? that’s mainly cuz people didn’t get out of their apartments, etc. like they did in Mt. View, etc.

join us on a test ride and give us your feedback during an actual ride. all i can say is more prep was put into this ride than all others and it’s too bad SJ riders freaked out and overreacted at a little cool weather. it’s warmer than going snowboarding, so what’s the big deal???

re: not high density?? not like around rivermark or at&t park in sf, but there were more 2-3 story apartments/condos/townhomes than in any previous bike party. 2-4x as much. many of these complexes had 100-300+ units. that’s high density in my book. didn’t see it? it was all around us….
ex: all of makati circle, entire left side of walnut blossom drive, 1/2 of hayes ave, eagles lane, tradewinds drive, ave del roble, ent cedros, all of velasco dr, all of ave arboles, left side of all of duesenberg dr, parts of senter and capitol expy and blossom hill
wanted more? pre-rides and post rides went by some too.

re: coyote – main problem there was many riders on both sides of road

ON A COMPLETELY DIFFERENT NOTE/PET PEEVE:
re: fast riders – as a percentage there were more riders – esp fast ones – that didn’t know where they hell they were going and helped mess up the ride. and ran red lights, made many illegal riding moves, veered from bike lane to middle lane, oncoming lanes, etc.

these riders are a nuisance and have a crappy attitude. no they weren’t drunk. just doing illegal stuff and annoyingly taking other riders off course and by not listening (and back talking) to BIRDs about how to ride safely by riding straight and taking over the lane (instead being erratic and putting other riders in harms way). this behavior is stupid and reckless and needs to stop. it is this behavior that pisses off drivers and gets them riled up and these car drivers feel they can take it out on other riders.

This month’s ride was a welcome change from the norm. The smaller turn out worked well considering the questionable weather and the shark game that night.

I agree that the pasted route information should be condensed and more direct. Too confusing with an overload of links.

Our test rides were pretty intense this month and the result was a welcome 20 mile ride. Maybe it the colder weather or the busyness of this time of the year, but a less ambitious millage was just what i needed this month.

Velodrome was AMAZING! Thank you for making this happen.

Despite the smaller turnout, I saw some
indicators that Bike Party is evolving and displaying signs of positive organic growth.
And for an all volunteer organization, requiring the kind of commitment of time, energy and coordination from folks behind the scene, that combined effort is indeed “notably awesome”.

A belated thanks to the guys from SJSU who worked on making — a first for SJBP — Second Harvest Food Drive happen without a hitch. The folks at Second Harvest were grateful. It was an excellent, low cost public relations home run for SJBP.
The Second Harvest folks would like to partner up with SJBP on more food drives, however; I could not unilaterally commit to any ongoing collaboration without some internal discussion and agreement within Bike Party.

Bike Party forever!

Thanks Bike Party for another great ride! Can’t wait for the next ride.

@29 scott :

If you want to simplify the delivery of routes, you may want to check out bikeroutetoaster.com . It can build turn-by-turn instructions and import and export map data from GPX/TPX files. There’s no membership sign-up and it doesn’t display ads on the map page:

http://www.bikeroutetoaster.com/Course.aspx?course=92710

I exported November’s ride from MapMyRide and imported it into bikeroutetoaster so I could use the Garmin browser plugin that loads the map directly onto my GPS unit, and using it I was able to stay on course and even direct crowds a couple of times. Neat stuff.

Incidentally if need and want to use a GPS unit to record the routes as you test-ride them, for later reference constructing the route, I have an extra Forerunner 305 I can loan you.

scott– thanks for the response; obviously you’re a good guy who cares about bike party and the experience of everyone.

i will most likely come to a test ride.

what i meant by not interesting was the reliance on very wide and high-speed roads like the expressways and blossom hill, and the sound walls and parking lots that accompany them, rather than more homes that face and are close to the street, and businesses that do the same, places with character and identity. the regroup spots were cool–nice choices

2-3 stories isn’t high density (and i say that in the most modest and respectful way possible, man), especially when, even in transit-rich areas, you’ve got lots of parking spaces that are “bundled” with each unit and renters/buyers must pay for parking whether they want it or not. highER than much of san jose, yes you’re totally right. anyway, i DO think it was cool we went by the areas you mention because most of those residents who got to see us got to see bike party for the first time.

where i happened to be, i saw LESS red light running or wrong-way riding than previous months… but i do agree there were too many people speeding along and not seeming to appreciate the company of others and the spirit of the ride. and yeah, in some spots, people were going too far to the right and riding too close to parked cars! please move left and STAY STRAIGHT, even when there are no parked cars for a while or when crossing a side street…

@tommy –
lets call it “old school” high density… the problem is our SJ high density in the newest sense if often 4 or 5 stories (all the same, not 4-8 stories mixed up) so even then it’s boring architecturally. then there’s the fact that these are just islands with boring roads inbetween.

the fact that this ride got separated out in a really long fashion was a bit perplexing. maybe we’re just used to 2-3-4k people, but when we had 500 -1000 people it was never so long and disjointed. but we did have lots of lights and turns in this ride… so the complexity was up.

i share your concern that a lot of riders think by not keeping a straight line and going back and forth that it doesn’t affect others. it does.

Lastly,thanks for the props tommy. Bike Party!

Dangerous Driver –
if anyone has a license plate number (or a partial) of a late model (05-08 [?] Lexus LS460, white) please let me know. we should file a police report against him…. he purposely drove too close and even veered into the lane and path of riders several times on blossom hill and almaden expressway at high rates of speed causing riders to veer to the right to avoid him.

i hope that everyone who sees an idiot like this takes pictures of the car, driver and/or license plate.

if we ride legally (yes we can occupy one right lane of traffic according to the CA DMV), then we can comfortably go to the police and say we’re doing our part. “when can you help protect us from these idiots?”

@garrett –
your pics look as great as ever… as if we’re there in the bike party mixing it up

regarding “bikeroutetoaster” if we an use that version, that could work well… what’s nice about MMR is the regroup location and that we can track the number of unique views.

what is not nice about it is the lack of universal printing, the ads, the quality glitches that occur all too frequently, the high overhead needed on a pc and the huge bandwidth needed to run it. a slow or even shared fast pipe slows it down tremendously.

I had a great time, the weather was nice and crisp and enjoyed all aspects of the ride. I did have some beligerent riders that failed to listen to me at some turns, where I was stopped guiding people into the first re-group. The way I look at it, you can only do so much to guide people, they are gonna do what they want, I am not gonna force the issue, I am just simply there to guide the people that want to follow the route. All in all thanks to all the people who came out to the test rides and all the organizers for such a great job. See ya on the 1st…

erik– that first regroup spot — which was cool by the way — was tough because paper maps, map my ride, yahoo, and google don’t show those new streets. if you’re more of a visual person, it’s nice to be able to look at a map. so the weirdness that happened around there was, i think, to be expeceted, what with the several turns and the streets being new.

if you’re referring to the ramp that looped down from blossom hill to cottle, yeah that was a little tricky because when i went by, the ride was really spread out and a friend who was behind me missed the turn. the turn-by-turn directions should’ve said “take the cottle exit” but whatever, most people figured it out i think.

anyway, hope the dummies not listening to you didn’t bother you too much…

scott– i am not an old-timer, but it seems to me that in the past, we more or less left from the regroups together as a group (sort of). whereas the first spot on friday, maybe some people left really quick cos they were cold, and others wanted to stay much longer. and at oakridge, there were two garages, plus it wasn’t super easy to have a lot of people go back down the ramps at the same time anyway… so i think that’s one way that the ride got really spread out. also, yeah, some people were going fast and just never looked back!

Signs – construction signs (the bright orange ones) and barricades (with lights) that could both be affixed with SJBP logos and arrows would be most helpful. IF anyone has access to these or knows someone that does, we’d love to borrow 10-20 of these per ride. (even 5 would help)

It is tough to ask BIRDs to stand at a point to direct traffic. They want to enjoy the ride and standing at a corner for 45-75 minutes is not the most enjoyable way to experience Bike Party.

Having said that, being in groups of 2-3 as BIRDs does make everything more fun… even that!

There will always be turns that are not obvious in some of our rides. The exit to Cottle,etc. was not obvious and it was not very well lit up either. The area is so newly redeveloped that it did not make the maps.

In general here is an issue: Many (> 1/2?) of the riders simply follow whoever is in front of them. Either they do NOT read their turn by turn directions or do NOT know how to read a map.
We’ve asked for 4-6 mos for assistance in this regard for a more simplified map…

All of our answers are there… we need SJBP riders to step up to the plate and create a map that shows ONLY the streets that we’ll be going on and not the clutter that is MapMyRide, etc.

The skillsets are out there Bike Party, we need your help!

My crew got to the meeting spot at 8:30 only do find an empty lot. because i did not have turn by turn directions i called a friend who was with the group. we did not catch up to the bike party untill the first regroup (which was leaving as we got there). we did see some sighs which pointed us in the right direction. those were a HUGE help and thank you to those who put on the signs!

This was my third ride in a row and I enjoyed it very much. Just wanted to say thanks to those who put aside alot of their time to put bike party on. You really do a good job! See ya in December!!!!

I was happy that it was cold and wet, it meant fewer riders and less hassle.
I was unhappy about the jackass on the mountain bike that cut me off causing me to crash which in turn caused my friend riding next to me to crash. He realized what he had done and stopped, but as soon as I bent down to inspect my bike, he took off.
And in the confusion someone stole one of my gloves. Just one, rendering my other glove useless. So if anyone took an all black Cannondale right hand glove, I’d like it back.

Hopefully December will be just as small.

I don’t think it’s the weather that’s shorting the rider count. Maybe, it’s because bikeparty has fell off. I’ve been on 14 consecutive rides, and haven’t been to the last 3. I don’t plan on going ever again, truly, because BP sucks.

@cody – more specificity would be helpful. giving concrete suggestions and actually stepping up and helping would be priceless. join a test ride and share. there are 3 this month. one should work for your schedule, but the ride may be fixed after the dec 6th ride.

@mason – the ride may be somewhere in the middle, 1500-2500 riders, if cool decent weather.

This was my first ride, and though it was cool, I overdressed and was perfectly comfortable. I liked that it was smaller so I could get a sense of what the routes would be like, and wasn’t intimidated by too many people. I’m not a huge bike rider, but came out to see what it was about, and I’m really looking forward to the next one!!

Suggestion: It was almost impossible to find a bathroom, as a girl!! Finding at least one meeting point that includes a usable restroom would be ideal!!

Thanks for all the hard work!!

Hey Cody, seems to me like you caught a bad case of Scrooge, grinch and sourpuss all at once.
We are all feeling the pinch of a tough economy, however; do yourself a favor and toss that bad batch of “ragweed” and get some decent “sinsemilla” to clarify your weird thoughts about the reality of Bike Party.

Get real dude
Bike Party is not a fad; it is a movement that is here to stay!
Don’t you nor anyone try to stop the Bike Party Freight Train ’cause you will get run over by thousands of bikes. (LOL!)

Peace my brethren.

^ ^