If you’re a bicyclist in the Rochester area, there is no shortage of groups that meet for regular rides: Rochester Bicycling Club, Wheel Women of Tryon, Rochester Bike Kids, Black Girls Do Bike Rochester, Rochester Bicycle Time! and Reconnect Rochester — by no means an exhaustive list.
And while many of the riders in these groups stick to a fair-weather riding schedule in spring, summer, and fall, there are hearty local cyclists who are active year-round.
One such cyclist is Barry Cherney, the founder of Just for Giggles Cycling. He started the group in 2012, when Full Moon Vista’s Scott Page stopped running Tuesday Night Urban Assault (TUNA) Rides. The now-defunct rides often served as a training session and a springboard for competitive racing for anywhere from 20 to 70 bikers. Cherney decided he wanted to do something similar with his own group, and things began modestly with Just for Giggles — three or four riders doing 20-mile trips through Durand Eastman Park, Irondequoit, and Rochester.
Now, Just for Giggles typically hosts three rides per week: the 20-mile flagship ride on Mondays, which meets at Three Heads Brewing; a Thursday trail race ride that starts and ends at Collins Pavilion at Schoen Place consisting of roughly 40 miles on an unpaved route such as gravel; and a weekend ride. The Pointless Hills ride through Irondequoit Bay runs on Sundays from November 1 through April 1, while in the summer there’s a Saturday morning coffee ride. Additional options include Wednesday’s Hump Day Ride and a wintertime ride on Saturdays for fat bikes with four to five-inch-wide tires.
A significant difference between the former TUNA rides and the current Giggle rides is intention. “Our goal is ‘just for giggles,’” Cherney said. “Our goal is to have fun. A lot of our rides start and end with beer and are brewery destination rides. Sometimes we ride fast, sometimes we ride slow, but we always have fun.”
Marty Petrella, a lifelong cyclist who has ridden more than 2,000 miles with Just for Giggles this year, says the consistency of the rides and the camaraderie between riders is what keeps him coming back.
He remembers a deal-making moment early on in his time with the group during a difficult hill ride through Irondequoit Bay. “I was dying to keep up,” Petrella said. “But when I got to the top, Barry was there and he said, ‘Good job, Marty. You keep trying, I’ll keep waiting for you.’ And that was like music to my ears.”
The group sticks to Cherney’s motto, “No Giggle left behind.” Every rider clears the hill before the entourage moves on, and if a new rider gets a flat tire, others will stop to help. All the rides are clearly identified beforehand, so cyclists know whether they’re getting themselves into a slow ride, a hill ride, a training ride, or something in between.
For Cherney, the reasons to choose cycling are clear. “Biking allows you the freedom to move great distances over a reasonable amount of time,” he said. “It gets you out of your life and it puts you out of your comfort zone once you start riding harder, and allows you to achieve a lot. I always say, it’s hard to become a good runner. It’s not hard to become a good cyclist.”
Just for Giggles is serious about being a year-round group. To Cherney’s memory, there’s never been a canceled ride since the group’s inception, although on rare occasions rides have been cut short due to storms.
In addition to regular winter rides, Just for Giggles Cycling hosts an annual holiday fundraising event called the Santa Ride. It’s a jolly, 10 to 12-mile affair for which riders don Santa, elf, reindeer, and penguin costumes, sing Christmas carols, and donate gift cards to Center for Youth. In recent years, Cherney says the group has donated close to $3,000 in gift cards.
If you’re intent on cycling in the winter, there are key strategies to keep in mind. Cherney recommends an inexpensive winter bike (perhaps a fat bike) that’s OK to get additional wear-and-tear from Rochester’s salted roads, in addition to owning a road bike for paved surfaces and a gravel bike or mountain bike that can handle trails. Jesse Peers, cycling manager at Reconnect Rochester, stands by studded tires, which can keep cyclists from slipping on the ice where a fat bike might falter. He also emphasizes the importance of layering and warns against overdressing in cold weather.
“Dress as you would if it were 15 or 20 degrees warmer,” Peers said. “The first five minutes are always the most uncomfortable. But once you get into a rhythm and you’re moving, you warm up rather quickly.”
And as for warming up to cycling itself, Cherney recommends novice bikers join a group ride with an unfamiliar route and location as a quick way to improve. “That feeling of ‘you have to keep up’ is the greatest training regimen there is,” he said. “That’s how I learned.” facebook.com/groups/jfgcycling
Daniel J. Kushner is an arts writer at CITY. He can be reached at dkushner@rochester-citynews.com.
This article appears in Nov 1-30, 2023.
