I fully intended to post these pix a couple days ago, but what with dodging Christmas shopping responsibilities for bike rides, I just didn’t get around to it.

I talked to my friend Nick yesterday. He rode the group ride on Thanksgiving. 7:30am on Thanksgiving was 14 degrees at Rock Cut. He said it was brutal. But there was no snow. When I rode on Friday, it was coming down pretty good.

It was 21 degrees according to my car’s outdoor thermometer. I expected the ride to be ugly. In fact I expected to be the only one in the park. I had called a few people who all conveniently had other plans. You know who you are. So I drove to the Lion’s parking lot and, holy cow, there was another car. A guy, Jeff, was getting ready to ride too. I’m not the only moron to go mountain biking in a snowstorm.

Here’s a link to Mountain Bike Action magazine for some tips on riding in cold weather.

Thanksgiving is the official start of the holiday season and, in keeping with the spirit of the holidays, today was a charitable day for the Rock Cut Trail Crew. A local radio station was sponsoring one of several food drives for the needy. Jeff’s idea was to ride in and donate a bunch of non-perishable food items to the needy. It would be a nice ride with friends, some good PR for the bike club, and an excuse to get out of shopping with the wives.

The plan was to meet and organize, ride to the food drive, then, continue on to ride a lap at Espenscheid Forest Preserve. But yesterday it snowed about a half inch yesterday. Today got up to 45. The trail was going to be very muddy. If “leave no trace” is the mantra, then today would not be a good day to ride the loop.

Four of us, Jeff, Al, Larry and myself, showed up to ride at the abandoned Highlander grocery store on South Alpine in Rockford. Not the gang we had hoped for. But the sun was shining and we had about 5 bags of food to donate, so we set off on our charitable trek with B.O.B. trailers in tow to the new Highlander grocery store, two miles away, where the radio station had set up their food drive.

The bike path along Charles Street alternated condition from wet and sloppy in the sun-lit areas, to icy and snow-covered in the shade. No problem for the three of us on mountain bikes. But Larry was riding his new carbon Trek road bike. Not sure the model, but it was nice and shiny. Couldn’t have had more than hundred miles on it and here he was, riding in the slop.

Pedestrians and motorists don’t care much for bicyclists even in the best of road conditions, much less in the snow and slush on the road today. Though the temperature was in the mid-40’s, we wore our cold weather riding gear, long sleeved jerseys, tights, and balaclavas, and were pulling trailers full of groceries. We got some pretty strange looks from people who must have thought we looked like some high tech hobos.

We arrived at the food drive where the radio station DJ was holed up in a heated Pepsi trailer watching satellite TV. It was the second day of the food drive, but the donations were coming in. Still, four guys riding up on bikes to donate food was apparently enough of a change of pace for him to mention it on the air, and although he referred to us as the “Rock Cut Trailer Crew,” we felt good knowing we had ridden for a good cause.