The first half of the Highway 40 The New I-64 construction project, is scheduled to be completed early, that is before the end of the year.  MODOT plans on opening the reconstructed section earlier then scheduled.  The St. Louis Regional Bicycle Federation is planing a bicycling event before this section on highway is opened to the cars.  Thanks to Gary & Linda of Team Kaldis for the following news:

A festival to celebrate the reopening of this section of Interstate 64 could happen as early as Sunday, November 23, and as late as Sunday, December 28.  This event definitely will be on a Sunday afternoon.   Dates not being considered because of the Thanksgiving & Christmas holidays are Nov. 30 and Dec. 21

The St. Louis Regional Bicycle Federation is hosting the bicycle ride on the interstate.  The ride will be on the eastbound lanes from from McKnight to Ballas, and/or Ballas to McKnight, as far as we can tell at this point.

We are working feverishly on preparations and have another meeting with MoDOT and some folks from the running community tomorrow.  We should have further details after that meeting.  The only thing that’s definite at this point is we are planning on having as much fun as possible on 66 ft x 4.9 miles of perfectly smooth pavement.  There will be a t-shirt … we know you want one…

We hope that this ride will raise funds for the St. Louis Bike Fed. We intend to use the money to install more of our fabulous bike racks designed by Justin Gerard of St. Louis.  Designs of the rack may be seen below:

We want this to be a party! It’s the holiday season, so we plan to have a “Homemade Cookie Stop” on the interstate.  We also are working on categories in which to offer prizes to people who dress their bikes in their “holiday best.”  Here are some that came up at today’s meeting:

Best holiday lighting
Best matching outfit
Biggest Turkey on a Bike
Best Santa on a Bike
Best “Bike Farty”

Now about the photo at the top of this post.  It was posted by Bob Foster on STL Biking.  I am the one over the red arrow.  It is almost fifteen five years old (December 1993 2003) * and represents my one and only race event.  It is a photo from the Page Extension Time Trial.  As you can see from the photo the weather was a little too white for biking.  The time trial race had the participents starting at thirty second intervals.  The three mile race course started off going up hill for a mile followed by a mile of downhill and then a mile of flats.  I got passed by the guy starting after me.  I still did better then most of my friends.  I won’t mention any names, but you know who you are.  I hope for better weather this year.

* Thanks, James