January - February 2005

Message from the President

In my first year as club President, the thing I most look forward to is what I can learn from you, and how we can make “The City’s Friendliest Bike Club” even better.

Looking back at 2004, I’m impressed by what we, the Five Borough Bicycle Club, accomplished:

We sent out over 100 day trips.

We saw our five Bicycle Repair classes continue to gain in popularity, particularly the ones held on Saturday morning.

Once again, the weather cooperated and we had a very successful Montauk Century.

We had 10 general meetings that included a Montauk-riding standup comic, a member of the NYPD bicycle patrol unit, a presentation on “randonneur” brevets for long distance riding, a summer picnic, an open forum on cycling issues, the head of the New York Bicycling Coalition, and travelogues that took us through Alaska and the Canadian Rockies.

To attract new riders and friends, in October we held the most ambitious “Get To Know Us” day ever, with 5 separate rides that ended in one big afternoon picnic.

Our membership was out in full force as marshals and volunteers for BIKE NEW YORK, which attracted over 30,000 riders.

Now, welcome to 2005.

I hope that what we did last year inspires you to get more involved with the club. There’s a lot you can do. Go for a ride. Take a bike repair class. Take the leadership training class. If you’re already a leader, please lead more rides, or get back into it – we miss you.Volunteer as a marshal in Bike New York. Volunteer for the Montauk Century ride. Take a weekend trip out of the City. Come to our meetings, and meet more of our members. See the world by bicycle, and tell us about it. Write an article for our newsletter.

As you can see, there is plenty to do and we can sure use your help. If you have any ideas that you would like to see this club do, or get involved with yourself, please feel free to contact me.

So have a great biking year, have fun and I will see you on the road.

Ed DeFreitas
President, 2005
President@5BBC.org