Hi all - moved to Newport News last week and would like to hook up with any of you interested in a training buddy. I’ve lined out most of my week, with masters swimming AM practices, weekend rides, but struggling to find suitable weekday rides. I live in Kiln Creek (work in Hampton) and learned of BikeBeat’s Saturday rides and plan to do Final Kick group stuff on weekends. Due to traffic/work, weekday training is restricted to Newport News and Hampton – Williamsburg would be a stretch, but maybe.
At the very least any suggestions on routes for a 60 min bike/30 min run brick in the afternoons? I’ve mapped out the Kiln Creek area which is okay for running I guess.
I grew up in Newport News… you will have a rough time finding good places to ride. I think i’ve posted on this before, but Williamsburg would be much better for cycling. You’ll learn how to get around town without the interstate (which is always backed up). Once you do that, getting to Williamsburg isn’t so bad.
In all honesty, you wont really be able to hop on your bike in Kiln Creek and head on out, you’ll have to drive somewhere. Traffic is pretty bad in that town, and the drivers are even worse. The problem is that the whole area has become a mini-metropolis. No big buildings, but mini mall after mini mall after mini mall.
Look at a map of the area and it will make sense. Its a peninsula, 20 some miles long, 5 or 6 miles wide. Think of Warwick and Jefferson as two veins that everything grows off of.
Call up Conte’s (LBS) and see what they can offer in the way of ride routes. I’m sure they’ll know of something. You could try the neighborhoods on the James river (Warwick/Hidenwood area), that might be good.
Yeah this is a tough one. I went to college at William and Mary and my fiancee’s family lives really close to menchville high school so I am reasonably familiar with the area. In order to get to williamsburg just take Jefferson Blvd west for about 30 minutes. The drive is better than 64 during peak traffic areas. I would guess once you get out of NN a bit there are decent rides but I wouldnt have the slightest idea where, maybe the colonial parkway.
Sure, colonial parkway is great if you like getting kidnapped and murdered. Well, ok, so that hasn’t happened in like 20 years, but still… Actually I think the parkway might not be the smoothest ride. If i remember correctly, its mostly a cobbled road. It there is a smooth shoulder it would make for a very nice ride.
I stand by my previous suggestion of Gloucester. From KC you can hop in 17 (i think thats what it is) and take that right through York and over to the bridge to get into Gloucester. That would be some good farmland riding.
I recently moved to the area as well. I live in Smithfield. Just across the JRB. The riding is great anytime during the day, but lonely! I work in Hampton and have found great running (Noland Trail & Sentera Trail) but no riding. Where is the BikeBeat ride?
I usually run the Noland trail Sunday morning for long runs.
The Final Kick workouts are great, but too far.
Hola,
Just found BikeBeat via google and their site, bikebeatonline.com has a couple rides from their 2 stores in NN and Williamsburg. The ride I’m referring to is their Sat morning ride leaving from their NN store (near Kiln Creek).
Not sure where Noland Trail is but sounds cool. I figure I’ll learn the Bikebeat Sat ride and Conte’s Sat ride for some good ol’ 30miler week day rides (not too long/short for me anyway) and a good prelude to a brick.
Noland trail is off of Warwick Blvd where the Mariner Museum is. Fantastic trail running. Its 5 or 6 miles, been a while, i cant remember exactly. http://www.mariner.org/visitorinfo/park.php. You can find a good number of 5 and 10ks in the area.
Hook up with Walt and the gang at Conte’s on Warwick. They’ve got a great road team going, and there are some strong multisports folks as well. I just moved to Quantico, VA from the condos by the Kiln Creek country club last year. Rides from Conte’s go out to Yorktown and Poquoson. Once in a while they’ll ride the Kiln Creek loop and do bunch sprints on each loop. When the strong guys are out…its a tough ride. Bike Beat is right there across the street, of course, but for my $$, I liked Walt and Conte’s better. If he doesn’t have it, he can get it from the other Conte’s stores in Norfolk and Va Beach. The Va Beach store puts Final Kick to shame in terms of tri bikes. Final Kick has a better multisport package, but Conte’s has more stuff.
As far as weekday rides, depending on your schedule, Walt and a few others do some strong weekday rides. I was down on Norfolk navy base, so I rarely got out with them during the week.
Colonial Parkway is a once-in-a-while ride…too bumpy for most of your riding. It’ll beat you to death. When I had my Litespeed Saber it was tolerable for long rides. My old steel frame Specialized road bike with aluminum fork was a jawbreaker.
Newport News County Park has some really nice wooded, groomed trail running. The main loop is about 7 miles so you can refill or stop for water if you do multi-loop run. Other than that, I usually ran at work or did loops of Kiln Creek.
Also, if you are interested in multisport teams…Colonial Racing Team is local there. They are growing quite a bit since I was on the inaugural team a few years ago. The folks are really nice and have a good atmosphere going.
Have they finally gotten all of Noland trail opened back up from the hurricane a couple of years ago? That thing was closed forever. Another nice trail if its open.
I currently live in Chesapeake but grew up in Hampton. The riding around NN and hampton isnt the greatest. I havent ridden with Contes yet but the shop in NN is good. The guys working there are always helpful. Final Kick is a good shop too. I bought my TRI bike there.They do a lot of there workouts in the First Landing park.
I like to run the Noland trail too, It is a little up and down and in pretty good shape last I ran it.
I am a member of CRT and we have a Sat ride in Williamsburg. Its a little bit of a hike from where I live so I dont make it as much as I would like. There is essentially 2 groups an A pace which is a 30 mile race and they actively are trying to drop each other (at least it seems) and a B group which re groups after the hills. The B group averages about 19mph. Its a mixture of Tri roadies. There is also a Monday ride on Ft Eustes this is interval type stuff a warm up and then a series of sprints along an empty road.
Let me know if I can give you any other info about this area. Check out the CRT website (Colonial Racing team) for other groupd workouts.
I live on the south side and have recently started riding on Sunday mornings with the Final Kick group. Rides are typically 50-70 miles and pretty informal. I have only been on a couple of rides, but this former roadie (long time ago now) turned MOP triathlete thinks that they have pretty good group manners. There is also a good mix of age and experience levels that adds a lot of energy and enthusiam to the rides. Come on out - the store in on W. Great Neck just south of Shore Drive.