The Last WNBR of ‘07



October 3rd was a fitting Wednesday evening for a fantastic season of Wednesday rides. The pleasantly sunny skies and nice biking temperature brought out a smiling bunch of riders to partake in the last official ride on the schedule. The circuitous route, snaking along several of the areas bike paths and through the Arboretum, appropriately felt like closure. And in true WNBR fashion, several generous individuals provided an impromptu tailgate grill-out and champagne toast, which we enjoyed at the Vilas shelter parking lot. We’ll try to get some pics posted of the evening’s festivities. Thanks everyone for a great season!

Great Season!



Great Season!



Great Season!



Great Season!



Great Season!



Do you want to be a Ride-Leader?

Several people have approached us who want to help out by being ride-leaders next year. What a great idea! New ride-leaders often bring entirely new routes or welcome changes to existing routes, thereby keeping our rides fun and interesting throughout the years.

There are several people on this year’s schedule that are ride-leaders for 2 rides. We are asking for new leaders to consider picking up one of these rides. You should contact that ride-leader and express your interest or E-mail WNBR directly.

After we have these poor overburdened ride-leaders relieved of their dual capacity, we welcome our new ride-leaders to contact any of the other ride-leaders to discuss their interest in leading a ride. Many of our current ride-leaders have been volunteering for years and would welcome a smooth transition into ride-following. As Ride-Leader you have full control over the route. We do however have a loosely applied “Code of Conduct” for our ride-leaders, which follows below...

Contact information for our Ride-Leaders can found on the Schedule.



Ride Leader Guidelines
If you follow these recommendations, more fun will be had by all:

• Try to keep your route off of major highways. Some county highways are experiencing dramatic increases in commuter traffic. If you can, plan these sections for the later portion of the route when it’s less likely to be busy, or against the traffic flow.

• Prepare a map. We are trying to get our routes posted on our Site so leaders don’t need to print as many maps. If you can email a “printable” map to the webmaster, at least a WEEK before the ride, you’ll be spared from printing out a lot of sheets. Otherwise, plan your printing accordingly. 100-200 sheets on a good weather night in the middle of the summer is not that uncommon.

• Pre-ride (or drive) the route a day or two before your Wednesday to be sure the roads are open and to check for fresh pea-gravel. If there are any surprises you should at least notify riders on the night of the ride. Describe what the issue is and where it is at. You could offer alternatives (or not). If people have a map and know about the obstacle, they can decide for themselves what to do.

• Show up on your scheduled Wednesday. Believe it or not, we have no-shows every once in a while and a panic spreads throughout the WNBR crowd. Not good. Try to be there at least a ½-hour before the start time. Sometimes something comes up and you can’t be there. If that happens please find someone to fill in for you!



The 2008 schedule will be posted in late March or maybe even early April, but rest assured that the first ride will be in Paoli, just like it always is!

Until then, look for the 2008 Bike Without Bikes (BWOB) season starting in the first week of January...