One of our favorite NYC Gravel Rides: Bike to Brew
It has been a strange summer with a late and uncertain start to racing, leading to an abbreviated race season that really only kicked into high gear in August. But we have still managed to fit in a number of non-racing adventures this year including TBD-MDC’s Asheville MTB camp and a big turnout at what we called Not Farmer’s Daughter. Another highlight of the summer was a ‘Choose your own adventure’ ride with our friends at Athletic Brewing and ACME that we nicknamed ‘Bike to Brew.’ In a year filled with so much uncertainty, Bike to Brew featured some of our favorite roads and was undoubtedly one of our favorite days on the bike of the summer. This is our recap of that ride, told in three parts:
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The ride up / Train up
As is often the case for a big ride, when Bike to Brew arrived there were varying levels of ambition. Some of us decided to gear up for an early morning start to tackle the full 100-odd mile route from NYC to Athletic Brewing. This meant gathering in Van Cortland Park at 7AM on a cloudy summer morning. Of course when 7AM rolled around, we lost one or two folks who decided to partake in a later start, but Lucia, Corey and I had a pretty delightful spin up to Katonah along the pedestrian only county railway system:
The slightly less ambitious (or perhaps more sleep oriented) crew gathered at Grand Central an hour or two later to catch the Metro North train to Katonah. This squad encountered the first of what would be several mechanical maladies on the way to Grand Central, but still made their way through midtown traffic to catch their train on time:
From ACME Bicycle to Athletic Brewing
Via train and via bike, the full squad coalesced at one of our favorite upstate destinations: ACME Bicycle Co in Katonah. It’s a beautiful shop, with beautiful riding just outside their front door. On this occasion we took in the Tour de France stage finish over coffee and doughnuts before eventually rolling out for the ride to Athletic Brewing.
The start of the route was beautiful, but we almost immediately encountered misfortune as Chris double flatted. This misfortune was compounded when the internal junction box for his Di2 came lose and he lost shifting. He persevered for a few miles before realizing that sixty rolling miles on a single speed was a stretch, so he called for the sag wagon. We were sad to lose him, but it was hard not to smile at roads like these, especially as the cloud cover started to clear and sun sunshine rolled in.
From there the miles ticked by quickly. We settled into a fast moving pace line, with our speed bordering on unreasonable for stretches. But it was hard not to be over eager given the quality of the riding as we switched from gravel to more paved back country roads the closer we got to the coast.
We had one or two more mechanical mishaps along the way including a botched tubeless repair that turned into a foam party of sorts (it’s a long story). But before long we were cruising up the Connecticut coast line, slightly jealous of the people hanging out at the beach while we pedaled on in ever rising mid-day temperatures.
Food, Refreshment, and a Train Home
The final few miles of the route were admittedly not so pretty as we had to cut through Bridgeport to get to Athletic Brewing, and the fatigue of a long day on the bike in hot mid-summer temperatures started to catch-up with us. But when we arrived at Athletic there were plenty of cold beers on tap and a pretty great food truck outside. In short, it was the perfect end to a long and hot day in the saddle.
After an hour or so at Athletic Brewing the only thing left to do was to head back into Bridgeport for the return train to New York City. We settled into a mostly empty train car and relaxed after a pretty perfect day on the bike. It’s definitely a ride and a route that we’ll revisit again. A Bike to Brew Fall Edition perhaps?
Photos by Scott Rettino
Photos by Matthew Vandivort
A New York City based cyclist and sometimes photographer. Part adventure rider, part crit racer, and fully obsessed with an English bulldog named Winifred.
Instagram: @photorhetoric
E-mail: matthew@tobedetermined.cc
