Bike About 2025 – Iowa
February 21, 2026 § Leave a comment
I have made it to Iowa in time for the start of this year’s Ragbrai. It will be the 52nd edition of the ride so Ragbrai LII. I can say now as I write this installment up that there were plenty of distractions during this phase of my trip and I didn’t keep decent daily logs as each day clicked away. Some of that was due to being part of a much larger event than my little jaunt across the country. What I found out was that rather than Ragbrai returning to the format prior to edition L (One L of a time!) which was 3-4 thousand cyclists, they had no cap on registration and the number was closer to twenty thousand cyclists. I joined the same group that I rode edition L with where there were some scratches, and some new editions. The main known protagonist being Pete Toohey whom I had been texting status all summer on my ride. We were to be joined by the Texas Meyers clan consisting of Robert, his son (name escapes me again) and daughter-in-law Amber and then the UVA clan (Amber is also UVA clan) that owes its Ragbrai attachment to one UVA alum, (K)Cat Rosenthal, who managed to convince a number of her VA girlfriends to “give Ragbrai a go”. The UVA girls are Cat, Amber, Heidi, and the other women whoose names escape me sadly including a new convert. There was also Ted the Diplomat who was riding with our group, doing his first Ragbrai before being deployed by the State Department to Somalia for his first assignment.
« Read the rest of this entry »Ragbrai L – Looking Back
September 10, 2023 § Leave a comment
My take away from this year’s edition should be a “What did I learn?” take away, and not a “What didn’t I like?” or a “What can I complain about?” post as I have read some summaries on the Ragbrai Facebook page, and to be honest, some of those posts seem like complaints to me.
I think one thing we have to agree upon first, is that this year was different. I haven’t even done this even before and even I can tell that it couldn’t possibly have been like this every year for 50 years. I did do it with some folks who have done it before, and more than once, and one of their general observations about Ragbrai was that the average age of participants was rising every year. Reading between the lines, that means that Ragbrai needs new blood, and that old farts like me are not, and should not be the target audience. I am glad that our group included 4 23-something young women and 3 early 30 ish young men, so that is something.
« Read the rest of this entry »
Big Bird's Adventures 