KC Star

Riding for exhilaration, exercise, FUN
Waldo watering hole is gathering spot for weekly bicycle rides throughout the year.
By LOUISE POLLOCK GRUENEBAUM
Special to The Star

"I dedicated the name of our club to all my friends who can’t have a boat. I used to play squash and fantasized about naming a club the Brush Creek Yacht Club."
Doug Stone, Chairman of the Prairie Village Yacht Club bicycling group

Lit by the radiance of autumn’s morning light, Lycra-clad bicyclists zoom across the horizon. Decorating the day in their day-glow colors, they resemble butterflies in motion.

These amateur athletes crave the rush of cold air and the sounds of the city as they pedal throughout the Kansas City area. And their numbers are growing as others join in their healthful and exhilarating way to exercise, while making friends along the way.

Ben Wilson says he wears cold-weather gear during the fall and winter while doing night rides.

“I love biking so I pedal whichever way the wind is blowing. We nickname guys like me “Show and Go’s. On Tuesday evenings I ride with 50 to 80 bicyclists on one-hour rides from the 75th Street Brewery in Waldo.”

Wilson jokes that his colleagues browbeat anyone not wearing a helmet. Lights located on the front and back of the bicycle are required. The fun continues with drinks and dinner at the restaurant. Because of the sport’s popularity, up to 200 people congregate weekly on Thursday nights at the Blue Moose restaurant in Prairie Village. Another hot spot on Wednesday evening is Chelly’s Café, a Mexican restaurant just west of 85th Street and Wornall Avenue.

“We meet afterwards in the Blue Moose lounge to eat, drink and socialize,” Wilson says. “I love biking so my weekends are spent riding with friends from the Prairie Village Yacht Club. It’s a social club with no dues or regulations.”

Another popular meeting place is the parking lot on 63rd Street and Brookside Boulevard in Brookside.

What does yachting have to do with biking? Just ask avid bicycler and club chairman Doug Stone.

“I dedicated the name of our club to all my friends who can’t have a boat,” he explains. “I used to play squash and fantasized about naming a club the Brush Creek Yacht Club. While I was filling out forms in preparation for long-distance tour to Colorado, the name ‘yacht’ just came to me as a fictitious title. So I named the club and the rest is history.”

An injury turned Stone to bicycling.

“In 1991 I had my torn cartilage in my knee repaired. Since then I became a serious rider, changing my focus to this low impact sport. I did the MS 150 ride and remember meeting other guys my age who ride on Sundays. They asked me to join their group.”

According to Stone, this group morphed into a 300-member, bi-state Yacht Club that doesn’t discriminate against anyone’s age or speed. These riders pedal from Kearney to Lee’s Summit. During the winter Kansas Citians can see swarms of brightly colored riders crisscrossing the city if the temperature remains above 5 degrees and roads remain ice free.

Stone says his jerseys are bright yellow with yachting flags and a wheel insignia.

“We ride 19 miles in the winter and 17 miles in the summer from Brookside” he says. “I’ve always been into exercise because it makes me feel well and I can concentrate at work.”

Year-round another hot spot is the Prairie Village Hen House. Riders congregate at 8 a.m. on Saturday and Sunday mornings for a long-distance ride.

Laurie Chipman has been riding since she was 6 years old. As a board member of the Missouri Bike Federation, she’s serious about bike safety. She believes bike paths in the Kansas City area could be improved and expanded. Currently Chipman is working with the Mid-America Regional Council in creating a bike map emphasizing routes and trails throughout the area.

“On the main streets there are traffic issues,” Chipman says. “We are working on a safe bike lane across the river on the Paseo Bridge. The Kansas City metro area is 15 years behind most cities on providing safe lanes for pedalers.”

Chipman has four bikes including a city cruiser, a touring bike and a mountain bike with fat tires (easier to ride than a 20-speed racing bike).

“It’s not always about speed,” she says. “The group at Brookside on weekends generally is an older crowd and rides slower. I ride my bike with raised handlebars in midtown to Westport and Brookside.”

Laurie adds that it makes sense to use bicycles for transportation. She and her husband got rid of one car to save on gas.

Chipman says members from the bike clubs of Johnson County and Kansas City collaborate in hosting a mega-sized bike ride in other counties. She says they are more formal and accommodate up to 500 people.

Bike advocate Maggi Hacker loves to ride because she feels like a kid again. Being over 50, she feels all her problems disappear when she rides year-round.

“I ride hard and as fast as I can most of the time. I also try to avoid injury,” Hacker says. “It’s challenging riding bikes in a town where there are so many aggressive drivers. It requires concentration, focus and nerves of steel at times.”

Hacker rides in a group to be more conspicuous and for the companionship.

“I like the people I ride with and I think bicycling is growing in this region,” she says.
Want to know more?

For more information on bicycling, check out these Web sites:

•mobikefed.org

•jcbikeclub.org (click on ride calendar)

•kcbc.org

•pvyc.org

•bikeleague.org