Last December I went on a Wednesday Wheelers ride. Well, I didn’t actually go on it, it was more like ships passing in the night, but I got to observe the Wheeler phenomenon in action.
I was off the week between Christmas and New Years, not with any grand plan, but because I had unused vacation days, and they would expire end of year. I was going to take some the week of Thanksgiving, but the house was crawling with in-laws then, so that seemed like a bad idea. I was looking for something different to do than my standard ride, the TGIF ride starting from my house. The day before I had ridden over to Ken Hablow’s house to drop off a check, not so much to save a stamp but that I wanted a new destination. So, when Eli told me about a Wheeler ride starting in Acton, that seemed like a goal. Riding out there and doing the ride would roughly double my usual mileage, but I figured worst comes to worst, I could just ride out, say hi and go home. The start was pretty close to my normal turn around point on Strawberry Hill Road anyway.
I had considered doing the whole ride, but another WW characteristic is stopping for lunch. Now, I generally don’t eat much lunch, and the thought of coming in from the cold and having to warm up all over again was not appealing. Given that the lunch stop was far enough away from the start for me to get lost on my own, I opted for Plan B, which was to ride with them for a while, then diverge and take the Apple Pi route home.
Now, back in the day, when Bill Widnall started WW, they were quite civilized. The stated policy was no rides if the temperature was below 45 degrees. But as time passed, the bar kept being lowered, and now there was a merry band setting out with temperatures barely in the 20’s. Not the usual cast of thousands, but numbers in the double digits.
So, we set out, and Bob the leader announced that we would stay together. This already was a departure from the normal CRW policy of leaving the stragglers for dead. I gather that even in warmer times with larger crowds, they post “human arrows” at the turns so no one is left behind. But beyond that, Bob commissioned a helper to cruise the pack and make sure everyone was still having fun. If not, there were a number of bailout points that could be taken to shorten the ride. The ride was well planned in this respect, the route folded back on itself numerous times so that it looked like the small intestine. Again, on a normal ride in the unlikely event anyone asked how you were doing, the question was largely rhetorical.
The ride was definitely hi-tech with the leaders brandishing cell phones and GPS units. You would have really have to go out of your way (no pun intended) to get lost on this ride.
So, I was beginning to see what all the fuss about Wednesday Wheelers was about. I’ve still got my dead end day job, so Wheelering is not in my immediate future, but I can see this as a regular retirement activity. I may even start eating lunch.
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