In my quest to regain my fitness after a crash that involved a broken collar bone, I found Cycle Folsom. A local club founded by Steve Ward. Their rides are challenging to difficult. They have two levels of rides, what I call the A group and B group. They have put together a variety of rides that are second to none. Go to cyclefolsom.com and check it out. The A group are fit, fast, like to climb, and the rides are not usually swept. The B group rides are much flatter and they have a no-drop policy. The B group is not slow by any means, but not quite as fast as the A group.TC had the opportunity to sit down with Steve and talk about Cycle Folsom. You can tell he is passionate about his club and cycling by the way he smiled and his eyes lit up. He is sincere, humble, and, I believe, part mountain goat (check out the profiles of his rides). CF has the rides posted complete with maps, profiles, and even cue cards. The weekend rides are usually posted Wednesday evenings. The rides start at Karen’s Bakery in Folsom and that is where we met.
TC: What year did you start Cycle Folsom?
SW: The best I can recall is the fall of 2006. At that point it was just a website.
TC: You have come a long way in three years. There is a lot of participation on the rides.
SW: We ride all year long. We have a solid core that rides even in the winter. It thins out a bit in the winter as you would expect and though there are not as many riders the rides are more serious. It’s a good training regimen. We have a tradition each year to ride the first or second stage of the Tour of California. This year we watched the prologue in Sacramento and then rode from Davis to Santa Rosa. Then we did the second stage from Santa Rosa to Santa Cruz.
TC: How was the first stage ride? Even the pros said it was one of the toughest days weather-wise.
SW: (laughing) We started with 11 riders and because of the weather we finished with 3. It was brutal. The first year was really unique for us because, one, it was the first year of the TOC and second, while we were riding the second stage Santa Rosa to Sacramento, the road over Trinity, we rolled up on Saul Raisin from Credit Agricole. He was making a comeback from a near fatal crash in Europe. He wasn’t doing the event, but he rode the course to get the training miles in and he shared 30 miles with us complete with support from his team car behind us. It was an awesome experience.
TC: You started because you were new to the area. How did you get people to show up for the rides?
SW: I didn’t know anyone. I started cycling, didn’t know where the roads went, I just went! The second cycling buddy, Quinn Hawkinson, I met was into networking and started a group called the Peloton. He put together a sizable riding club. He would get the people to the ride and I would lead the ride. He got tied up with other commitments and wasn’t able to maintain it so it kind of just folded. The following fall is when Cycle Folsom started and with his blessing we used his mailing list. So we started with a core of riders.
TC: You have a vast library of rides. How did you come up with the rides, trial and error?
SW: Like you I wanted to make improvement in my riding and I was finding out the way to do that is with different specific workouts. To do these workouts you need to know the terrain and where to find it. If I wanted to do a speed workout, I needed flat uninterrupted terrain. If I wanted to do hill repeats, I needed a hill the right length and steepness. I was new to the area and couldn’t find it anywhere. I figured the best way was to just make it myself. Then make it available to everyone else and THAT was the real reason for Cycle Folsom. To answer your question it was a lot of trial and error. I bought the Garmin GPS put it on my bike and recorded my rides starting and stopping right here on this corner. If I liked the ride I would download it and get the elevation chart, map, the motion based piece of it, write a description, put it all together in a package with a cue sheet and post it on the website to make it available to everyone. We all benefit from it.
TC: You started because you were new to the area. How did you get people to show up for the rides?
SW: I didn’t know anyone. I started cycling, didn’t know where the roads went, I just went! The second cycling buddy, Quinn Hawkinson, I met was into networking and started a group called the Peloton. He put together a sizable riding club. He would get the people to the ride and I would lead the ride. He got tied up with other commitments and wasn’t able to maintain it so it kind of just folded. The following fall is when Cycle Folsom started and with his blessing we used his mailing list. So we started with a core of riders.
TC: You have a vast library of rides. How did you come up with the rides, trial and error?
SW: Like you I wanted to make improvement in my riding and I was finding out the way to do that is with different specific workouts. To do these workouts you need to know the terrain and where to find it. If I wanted to do a speed workout, I needed flat uninterrupted terrain. If I wanted to do hill repeats, I needed a hill the right length and steepness. I was new to the area and couldn’t find it anywhere. I figured the best way was to just make it myself. Then make it available to everyone else and THAT was the real reason for Cycle Folsom. To answer your question it was a lot of trial and error. I bought the Garmin GPS put it on my bike and recorded my rides starting and stopping right here on this corner. If I liked the ride I would download it and get the elevation chart, map, the motion based piece of it, write a description, put it all together in a package with a cue sheet and post it on the website to make it available to everyone. We all benefit from it.
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