We are into the 3rd month of year, which means approximately 1 month to go before the weather will be consistently warm enough for us to ride outside. (Yay!) With that said, the board and I have been doing a lot of planning in preparation. Something new this year is the Opening Day for Trails celebration sponsored by Rails to Trails Conservancy and Friends of the Rock Island Trail. RTC’s headquarters (based in Washington DC) had reached out to FRIT in co-sponsoring this event. RTC has slated March 28 as the national opening day for trails. IVW will be involve in helping to lead a ride. Besides bike ride, the opening day celebration will also have a hike lead by the Pimiteou Trail Club, nature & bird watching hike organized by Peoria Audubon Society along with several other activities. You can read more about it in the attached flyer.
The club will have a new ride series lead by fellow member Terry Hunt called ‘Best Rides of Illinois.’ These rides will be held throughout the state, will only be announced through email and won’t be posted on the IVW website nor social media as we want to make it exclusive for club members. Terry will have a informational meeting on March 5, 7 pm at Starbucks (corner of Knoxville & Pioneer Pkwy in Peoria) for those of you who have route suggestions and would like to help with planning.
Also, Cycliq, the maker of the world’s only tail-light/camera and head-light/camera, has offered our club a group discount rate. The fly6, a tail-light/camera system, have 3 lighting modes, 4 dim settings, with up to 6 hr battery run time, can shoot increment photos, record 720pixel video with audio and do much more. The fly12, a newly launched head-light/camera system, can record 1080pixel HD video with audio, put out 400 lumen of light, with up to 10 hr battery run time, connect via bluetooth or wifi to your smartphone for quick upload videos/photos, just to list a few features. Both products are designed by cyclists who are safety conscious on the road. Fellow member Mike Honnold (cannondale_25@juno.com), who own the fly6, can attest to that and will be happy to answer any questions you have. For more information, please click on the link to each product below and see attached file. We will do a bulk order for those who are interested in purchasing either product in order to receive a group discount.
(fly6 tail-light/camera: http://cycliq.com/product/fly6)
(fly12 head-light/camera: http://cycliq.com/ )
On a different note, I mentioned from previous emails the club was considering creating a members directory after the survey results were tallied back in November. After multiple attempts to get feedback from members with only a handful responding, I have concluded the majority of you are not interested. However, if you like to get contact info for certain members, I will be happy to forward your info to the members you want to connect with.
Lastly, we will be launching a ride notice alert this year. Some of you had mentioned to me there was lack of communication regarding ride canceling last year due to each person’s preferred method of contact. Some of you rely on facebook, some by email while others by text. The ‘rained out alert’ will solve all issues as it supports all platform of prefer communication (text, voice mail, email, Facebook, Twitter, etc).
