Location: Ride Headquarters in Sherborn, MA
Ride Type: Mixed Terrain Ride
Date & Time: Weekly Friday evenings usually 7:00pm departure - Starting October 5th through Black Friday, November 23, 2018 - Start time on Nov 23 is 3pm for a ~30-mile total ride!
Distance: ~15 miles typically for a 9pm return
Price: Free
Details: The Friday evening mixed-terrain ride takes cyclists all over Sherborn. The ride follows paved roads to trails, dirt roads, grassy areas, and other places off the beaten path.
The ride departs at 7:00pm each ride except for the November 23 Black Friday special long edition of the ride. On Black Friday, November 23, the ride will be ~30 miles long and start at 3pm. The regular Full Moon ride is running this evening, too, with a 7pm departure. The difference between the two is distance. Pace and route-type will be similar to both. Both groups will return back to Ride HQ about the same time to enjoy good social time, drinks and snacks together.
The Friday Night Lights ride is about 15 miles or ~2 hours. We have a designated Ride Headquarters Super Domestique leading the ride and pointing out turns. We don’t have a sweep rider for this ride and riders who fall off of the pace will need to be comfortable navigating back to the start. It's not fast, but it's also not a no-drop. The group will wait for mechanicals.
You need to have had experience riding single track with somewhat technical features (roots, rocks and bridges and climbing) during the day before participating in this ride at night.
Lights Required: You must bring a front light of 500 lumens or more that will last 2 hours on one charge, a helmet light is advised though not required, and a rear light that can stay on steady without blinding riders behind you. More equipment requirements are listed further down on this page.
Route: The route is available to attendees the evening of the ride. The weather and trail conditions dictate the route. We do not ride on soft trails ever; we have rain trail-friendly routes prepared.
Estimated time: ~2 hours
Ride Notes: The pace is a moderate 8-9mph on the trails, ~16mph on the back roads. Another way to say this is that it is difficult to hold a conversation, but is not fast. We ride together.
Last Minute Information: Watch Ride Headquarter's Twitter feed for last-minute updates, weather cancellations or other changes.
Contact Information: Email - connect@rideheadquarters.com, Phone - 508-975-4678
Riding Rules, What to Bring, How Our Rides are Different: All riders are required to read and are expected to abide by These Rules.
Waiver: Ride Headquarters requires a signed waiver before your first ride. Please fill it out online prior to your first ride.
Proper Bike for this ride:
32c knobby tires minimum. Wider tires are nice, too. Tire choice depends on your riding skill set.
Clipless pedals and shoes. These are important elements of bike control. If you ride with platform pedals you’re likely to be over your head in some of the more technical parts of the ride.
A bike that’s in safe working order. We don’t stop for preventable mechanical issues.
Higher tire pressure than you’d ride on a cyclocross ride. We recommend about 80% to 90% of maximum rated tire pressure, for two reasons:
First, we want to minimize flats on the ride; waiting for someone to change flats is not why we ride. We typically see zero flats on our ride. One of the primary reasons for this is due to higher than average tire pressure.
Second, on average, about 30% of the ride is on pavement; having slightly higher pressure makes the road sections go by faster.
We do not recommend fenders since sticks and twigs can get caught in them.
How do we decide if we’re having the Friday Night Mixed Terrain ride?
Thunder storms: If there’s a 33% or greater chance of a thunder storm at the ride start time, we don’t ride. It is not safe to get caught out in a thunder storm.
Rain or sleet: There are a few variants of this. We don’t ride sensitive trails when they’re wet; this can cause damage that’s not repairable. Fortunately, we have some rain-friendly routes that don’t damage sensitive trails.
If it’s raining at the start of the ride we probably cancel the ride. If it’s only threatening rain, we ride.
If it’s misting or drizzling at the start of the ride, with less than 50% chance of rain in the coming hour, we ride.
If it’s been raining a lot for a couple days, but not raining the night before, we ride. Our rain-friendly routes avoid sensitive trails. Of course, every few years there’s such a bad storm that we won’t ride; we take the force majeure very seriously.
Snowing: We ride; it is so much fun to ride during a snow storm.
Snow on the ground: We ride. It doesn’t matter if there’s 1 inch or four feet, we ride. We recommend studded tires or fat bikes for these kinds of conditions. The only exclusion to snow riding is when there is a state of emergency and we’ve been asked to stay off the road.
Icy conditions: We ride. For this you have to have studded tires in order to ride with us.
Cold: It doesn’t matter what the temperature is, we ride.
If you'd like us to do any work on your bike prior to the ride, please email us the day before so we're ready to do the work as soon as you come in; we want you to be ready to roll before the ride starts.