Good Morning!
Boom-shaka-laka-waka-haka(OK is that getting too much?) Yet another fantastic week for ERTC, which saw all of our regular rides with great attendance, including the weekend rides, despite the races going on! I can see our regular training rides making you all more confident, and faster on bicycles, even though you might not see it for yourself! ERTC did amazing at the races this weekend, with Brandon Langille clean sweeping the Cat4 races and Robin Kim earning his Category 4 upgrade. A huge shoutout to Graham Watts, Kent Flood, Brad Malacko, Graham Rogers, Andre Ratte, Alex Inglis, Keith Pask, Greg Nicholson, Spencer King, Jakob Claffey, Dan Arndt, and James Carver for flying our colours and representing our club!
Announcements:
June 26th – MEC Gran Fondo – We are co-hosting this event with MEC and would love for you guys to come out and either ride or help out! We would love many hands on deck for this. Please e-mail me if you are interested in helping out. It is completely possible to ride and represent our club at the same time at this event. We would like to grow and promote the club and this is an important step in doing that. It’s also a good opportunity to work up to the longer distances of the Tour d’la Alberta taking place later this summer. I’ll let the website do the talking: http://events.mec.ca/event/116436/mec-edmonton-summer-century-ride
July 24th – Our sponsor, Revolution Cycle is hosting the Tour d’la Alberta again this year. It is a fully supported 60/100/160km ride and definitely one of the BEST options for you if you want to attempt one of these distances for the first time, as there are regular breaks for refueling and water, as well as a lunch stop. There will be a vehicle to drive you to the next break point or back to the line should you choose pull out. This is one of the biggest events of this type up here in Alberta (if not the biggest) We are making this a focus event and encouraging ALL ERTC members to attend if they can – we are getting a $15 discount on entries (use coupon code “ertctda2016”) and we will have our tent and chairs set up at the start/finish line. 2 randomly chosen registrants from ERTC (Registered before July 1st) will be refunded their races fees as part of our sponsorship as well. Our race team members will be out, as well as many of our non-racing members. You will never ride alone! I will let the event page and registration page do the rest of the talking. http://www.tourdalberta.ca/
We are hosting 2 road races this year. I will let our Race Director, Andre Ratte, talk about what we need for those:
“Circle these dates on your calendar, July 17 and Aug 21!
We are already 3 weeks into the race season and it’s about time we start talking about the events that we have coming down the pipe. As one of major bike clubs in the province there is an expectation that we contribute to the hosting the events that make up our provincial race calendar. For the road season, we are planning an individual time trial in Strathcona County on July 17. I was going to wait until we have cleared the final hurdles before putting out the call for volunteers, but being 7 weeks out I better give everyone the heads up that we’re going to need your help to pull off the event. The July 17 ITT was already on the ABA race calendar, but what you probably don’t know is that we are also planning a gravel race/fondo on Aug 21. ERTC will be returning to the Pigeon Lake area to host a gravel grind that will take you along the roads less travelled. Hopefully the picturesque scenery will distract you from the burning in your legs while tackling the challenging gravel roads.
I would really to call on all members that plan on racing our own events to supply a friend or family member to help with the volunteer requirements. For the non-racers, this is a great way to contribute to the club that organizes your weekly rides and provides you with a supportive atmosphere to enjoy all the bike related fun.
I’ll be putting out the official call for volunteers once we’ve cleared all the hurdles, but if you (or someone who you know) has Standard First Aid and could possibly volunteer on July 17th, can you let me know? This will probably be the hardest volunteer position to fill and I’d love to know now if there are several people that can fill this role. Thanks!”
Alright last but not least are ride changes:
Tuesday will have the regular interval ride meeting at Hawrelak for this week. The Women of ERTC group will be using the Research Park this week for some drafting and cornering practice so we will do our intervals at Hawrelak Park this week. I will be posting a poll about switching to the “classic intervals” on Facebook.
Wednesday Night Casual Rides this week is a GO! Our glorious leader is back and ready to lead this ride! Please come out if this is one of your first rides with the club, want an easier midweek ride, or just want to meet some new people without having the gasp for air!
All other rides will happen with no changes.
Aight, toodles for now!