FSLNHPP 2022 (Freezing Saddles Last Night Hains Point Party)

[danlesh]

In a word YES!

In more words: the DC Bike Party crew can lead the effort and make this happen. I had a post a while back about us hosting a “hamster dance” and weather and scheduling conflicts had us looking into early March. Buuuuut… if folks are cool with us bring a somewhat larger crowd to the scene to cheer on the final laps, I think this could be quite serendipitous for the closing party.

Generally what we’re thinking is:

• we’ll promote the event with the bike community, asking folks to party with us and welcome the spring
• we’ll lead a group ride at 8pm from Dupont Circle to Haines Point
• and we’ll park our mobile sound system at the southern parking lot where folks can dance and socialize all night, and/or loop de loop de loop de loop…
• around 11:15 pm we’ll get the sound system moving and invite everyone there to roll around the island “party pace” a couple more times… then we’ll be off!
• we’ll end the season finale HP ride back at the southern lot, we’ll eat some toasty toast (or something like that) and call it a night.

Sound good? If anyone else can help we’ll absolutely welcome it. Particularly, we might want to take up a bit of a collection for the toast part to make sure we have enough… bread.

@Steve O 217167 wrote:

Freezing Saddles ends at 11:59:59 on March 19, the last full day of winter.

Every year since 2014 Freezing Saddles participants have gathered at Hains Point, ridden in circles, stopped their GPS devices shortly before midnight, and shared a toast to curse winter and celebrate another year of Freezing Saddles.

For the first time this year, I will miss this illustrious event, as I will be in N. Carolina for Croatan.

Therefore I am asking for someone else to take on the task of promoting and “organizing” the FSLNHPP. There’s not a lot to organize, actually. It’s mostly communicating with participants and teams and encouraging people to bring food, drink and entertainment to Hains Point. And then wrangle the riders for a final group lap in time to finish before midnight.

[DrBullet]

Are food trucks allowed down at Hains Point?
…that might be an easier option than having to bring/arrange food…if they are allowed there…or nearby??
It will be a Saturday night…seems like a good time to party 😎

[danlesh]

@DrBullet 217396 wrote:

Are food trucks allowed down at Hains Point?
…that might be an easier option than having to bring/arrange food…if they are allowed there…or nearby??
It will be a Saturday night…seems like a good time to party 😎

nerp .

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[jrenaut]

While I appreciate the offer and think DC Bike Party is great, I would not be in favor of you all taking over FSLNHPP. It’s a Freezing Saddles party, not a bike party – the whole point is to celebrate the last day of being obligated to go ride your bike in crummy weather. Having a bunch of people there who didn’t go through the competition together just doesn’t feel right.

[arlcxrider]

Yeah, not a big fan of amplified music, food trucks, etc., in a park setting. Plus it’s expressly prohibited by NPS regulations. Keeping a lower profile might be a good idea. There is enough obnoxious behavior at HP/Ohio Drive as it is.

[danlesh]

@jrenaut 217448 wrote:

While I appreciate the offer and think DC Bike Party is great, I would not be in favor of you all taking over FSLNHPP. It’s a Freezing Saddles party, not a bike party – the whole point is to celebrate the last day of being obligated to go ride your bike in crummy weather. Having a bunch of people there who didn’t go through the competition together just doesn’t feel right.

This is a fair perspective which is why I wanted to post for discussion / perhaps consensus(?) before just doing it.

To be clear, our offer is to invite and encourage a wider group of cyclists to join / cheer us on. They might just mind their own business, but they might also talk to us… and might even consider doing it next year…. or they might not, you know? We would be inviting more folks to the large open public space, so this would be different from the smaller event I attended last year.

We would bring sound. That is sorta our thing, and I’d just say a couple different community rides have been doing similar “chill vibe” sorts of bike/dance events every month since 2020 without attracting Park Officials. The sound from the trailer is actually quite directional, meaning that if we point it in one direction it doesn’t “bleed” very much in other directions in a wide open space. (Incidentally, I was at HP doing laps on NYE and there was a group that set up a PA system outside a RV. Park Officials did ask them to shut it down around 1:30 am.)

We are *not* talking about food trucks though, but since we’ll be there a while, we would encourage folks to pack snacks / picnics.

I’m not particularly plugged in to leadership here but is there a process? Is anyone else offering to organize the party on the 19th? If DCBP isn’t going to then we’d still like to try to make the Hamster Dance thing materialize before the 19th, and then it sounds like someone else would need to take point for the official FSLNHPP.

[Steve O]

@jrenaut 217448 wrote:

While I appreciate the offer and think DC Bike Party is great, I would not be in favor of you all taking over FSLNHPP. It’s a Freezing Saddles party, not a bike party – the whole point is to celebrate the last day of being obligated to go ride your bike in crummy weather. Having a bunch of people there who didn’t go through the competition together just doesn’t feel right.

OTOH – The idea of Freezing Saddles is to build community, and spreading the joy of FS to others isn’t necessarily a bad thing. Some of these bike party people may end up being avid participants in FS2023.

We’ve also had music before, although on a smaller scale (like bluetooth speaker), and balloons and stuff.

And, of course, FS doesn’t own Hains Point. Anyone can ride their bike around for any reason they want, so if Bike Party wanted to do so, they could.

I would support this, in particular if Bike Party promoted it as a Freezing Saddles event at which they are invited and welcome guests.

I guess if there are 250 BP folks and 25 FS it might seem out of balance, but given it’s a Saturday, I bet there will be more than 50 FSers.

[danlesh]

@Steve O 217522 wrote:

in particular if Bike Party promoted it as a Freezing Saddles event at which they are invited and welcome guests.

I guess if there are 250 BP folks and 25 FS it might seem out of balance, but given it’s a Saturday, I bet there will be more than 50 FSers.

We could definitely promote it like that.

I agree the turnout # is a bit unknown… we’d almost certainly start the evening with more community folks than will stick around until midnight.

[Steve O]

As the unofficial organizer of the FSLNHPP, even though I won’t be there this year, I’d like to unofficially invite Bike Party to share Hains Point with Freezing Saddles on the night of March 19.

I think it will be fun, and I’m sorry I will miss. Go for it.

Sent from my H3123 using Tapatalk

[danlesh]

Thanks Steve O – sorry you’ll miss it too, but we’ll do our best to make this awesome!

[HokieBeth]

DC Bike Party is awesome! [emoji322][emoji322][emoji322]

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[Steve O]

Someone will need to bring those little toasting-sized paper cups to put the toast in.

And, of course, if you are feeling celebratory and generous, bring toast to share. I believe I have some of both of these I can provide (LMK and we can arrange a handoff), but you will need more.

Costumes, decorations, etc. will add to the festivities and are highly encouraged.
Freezing Saddles teams may want to set up their own tailgate to highlight your awesomeness.

I also usually bring a sign-in sheet for FS participants to see which team had the most attendees. Not required, but nice to know if someone wants to take on this task. Best if you plan to get there fairly early – you can always hand it off if you leave before the end. All it takes is a clipboard, pen attached with a string, and sheets of paper with columns for name and team name. Leave at one of the tailgates and make sure everyone spreads the word to sign in. Someone who will be there at the end needs to take responsibility for not forgetting it.

This is the traditional FSLNHPP location for support vehicles, music, social gathering between laps and 11:59 pm toast.

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Also, if someone wants to borrow my unicycle to do the traditional one lap on one wheel, I’m happy to loan it out.

And also, if you haven’t turned on your flyby on Strava and you used to enjoy it, it makes for fun next-day viewing

[SamScruggs]

Thanks @Steve O! The DC Bike Party team has put together a flyer to promote the Last Night at Haines Point. We’d like to post to our page to get some people out to support FS. We wanted to post it here first!

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[bikedavid]

The last people standing at midnight!

[Sophie CW]

Here’s a nice group photo from Serder’s friend Rodney:

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