Gravel Girls
Polly picked out a great route for a group ride from New Brunswick to Princeton, NJ this past Sunday. She invited her co-worker, Meredith, whom I met for the first time for this ride, and her friend, Zoe, whom I met at the Mashing Through the Snow Alley Cat back in January. I was excited to ride with a new group of people and enjoy the nice weather that the day afforded us. I met Polly and Meredith at GAP so that we could ride together to Penn Station to catch the train to New Brunswick.
The three of us rode to Penn in our brightly colored outerwear, and shoved ourselves into a tiny elevator to get down to the NJ Transit area.
We met Zoe, who was dressed in all black and a safety triangle, that helped her match with us a little bit more! Once we were all together, we made our way down to the tracks to find a handicapped car that allows for bicycle storage. There was some movement between cars when one couple didn’t want to cooperate with us, but the two men sitting in the next car were more than willing to change seats so that we could sit with our bikes.
We got to New Brunswick and were immediately hit with the wind, which would end up plaguing us for the duration of the ride, but the warmer temperatures and sunshine definitely helped. There were a few miles of riding on the road before we reached Colonial Park.
From Colonial Park, we connected with the Delaware & Raritan Canal State Park Trail, a seventy+ mile gravel/dirt trail. I don’t know why I keep pretending that I can ride all of this gravel on my road bike, but so far, I haven’t had any issues. It was a beautiful day to be outside riding along the canal, and it was made better since it was with such an easy-going and fun group of people.
We continued on the path for a few miles and decided to take a break when we reached one of the canal locks. We enjoyed the sun (especially Zoe), and met Pat, who was riding in the opposite direction of us. We talked a bit about gravel riding and she shared that she is running a workshop, “Mental Skills to Help You Crush Your Bike Adventures,” at the upcoming Girls Gone Gravel festival in Arkansas!
Pat was kind enough to take some great group photos of Polly, Meredith, Zoe, and myself.
Thank you, Pat!!!
We rode about ten miles along the gravel trail before switching back to some roads that would take us over to Hopewell for lunch. THE HEADWINDSSSS.
Our lunch stop was Brick Farm Market. We snagged a picnic table in the sun and I watched the bikes and stretched my old body and back while the youngins went to grab food first (on this trip, it was made known to me that I am no longer considered a “young adult” - we were talking about a ride and the cut-off age for registration was thirty. I guess I should have known this, but I didn’t want to hear it!). We ate some delicious food and smoothies and I snagged a soda for some extra sugar.
After lunch, we had one climb and then enjoyed the remaining ten miles riding through some fancy neighborhoods and Princeton’s campus!
From the campus, we headed to Princeton Junction to catch the train back to NYC.
Once we were back in the city, we said goodbye to Zoe, and Polly, Meredith, and I made the ride back to Brooklyn. We spent time debating if we would stop at Dough on Vanderbilt for some end-of-ride donuts, but we had been out for the majority of the day and I knew I was at least ready to get home.
We rode about fifty-three miles in total and I cannot tell you how elated I was to have had minimal back pain while riding. As much as I hate to admit it, my serious stretching sessions have really been paying off. I spent about an hour doing my stretches and exercises the night before the ride and made sure to get up a bit early for another half an hour of stretching before getting into the saddle. My chiropractor has dropped my appointments down from 2x/week, to 1x/week, to 1x/2 weeks! I’ve never felt this strong so early in the year (a milder winter certainly helped with all the extra rides I could get in outside), so I’m curious to see how the rest of this season turns out. Hopefully no more injuries???
