Will BAFS influence your behavior?

[Raymo853]

Regardless if this is your first time or not, do you think taking part in the Freezing Saddles Competition will influence your bike based behavior? Will you ride more, start doing sleaze rides, try to increase your mileage over normal winter riding, …. and so on.

Personally, I have been absent from BAFS for three years. I moved to CO for a few years, and was just not into do it so remotely. Now that I am back in VA, I am more inclined.

My planned change? I am using BAFS as a reason to restart being serious about riding. For the last two years, I have been too focused on the needs of getting my little farm up and running.

Topic

[jrenaut]

Most of my changes to behavior from BAFS happened years ago and are now just a part of my life, but I do make some changes. I’ll take the long way after dropping my daughter at school sometimes, or the long way to pick her up. We’ll definitely ride to some breweries, although I don’t know that we’ll be at the top of the list this year. I’ll be less inclined to drive to pick her up in the afternoon (Morning drop in the car is awful, we basically never do that, but afternoon pickup is fine). I’ll make an effort to do some weekend rides for fun (I’ve only done one since I got back on my bike after the Achilles tear – this is partly because my fitness level isn’t where it was before, but that’s not the whole reason).

[bentbike33]

@Raymo853 195275 wrote:

… dong sleaze rides ….

Not sure what these are, but they sound dangerous, or at least uncomfortable, to do in cold weather.

[Steve O]

Playing Freezing Saddles doesn’t change the riding I do except for the reindeer games. I already ride my bike pretty much everywhere I go.
Playing Calvinball the last couple of years, though, definitely had me riding to places and at times I would never otherwise.
The fact that helped my team was a side benefit.

[rcannon100]

I usually drink more during BAFS but thats largely Robyn’s fault

[LhasaCM]

I’ve said this elsewhere, but I’ll repeat it here. For me, my first year (2017) participating in Freezing Saddles is what changed my bike-based behavior, finishing the job SafeTrack started in convincing me that yes, I actually can ride every day for most every thing. Signing up again this year is more about forcing me to pay attention to, and hopefully participate in, some of the social aspects that go along with this that I otherwise would, by my nature, avoid.

[G-Daddy]

Awesome question!

It’s my first winter riding outdoors. I’m motivated so that my bike handling doesn’t degrade as much as it usually does when I’m on an indoor trainer all winter.

But it doesn’t take a lot of outdoor riding to keep that going, so to answer the question, I would definitely say “it depends”. If the team I end up on wants to compete, that will absolutely have me commuting more days per week and more sleeze miles for errands. If my team’s attitude is just “meh” then I’ll do what I was just planning to do.

[Rod Smith]

I resolve to ride more this year.

[secstate]

Because I work from home 2-3 days most weeks and can do all my shopping on foot, I am not a daily rider. During BAFS, I get out for at least a short ride every day, and the team competition motivates me to get in at least one longer ride each week. There’s probably some value in that.

[C Russell]

I hoping to find a bit of motivation to get out the door and endure the first 20 minutes…

[AlanA]

@secstate 195292 wrote:

Because I work from home 2-3 days most weeks and can do all my shopping on foot, I am not a daily rider. During BAFS, I get out for at least a short ride every day, and the team competition motivates me to get in at least one longer ride each week. There’s probably some value in that.

Glad to see I’m not the only “foot shopper” on here. I have everything I need within walking distance and just find it easier to walk a short distance than to do the same on a bike.

[awitt]

The whole idea of riding in the winter started for me when I joined Freezing Saddles for the first time two years ago. But getting out when its cold is still hard and I’m more likely to do it if I participate in FS. I now have a job I can ride to and I’ll be more likely to ride than drive because it puts points on the board.

[ChristoB50]

I was a bystander (and pointless prize player) last year as my first year on a bike and familiar with BAFS… and even not officially in BAFS then, it made me (quite surprisingly) bike pretty actively through my first winter ever on 2 wheels. I don’t think I’ll get registered officially this year either, but I plan to use BAFS again to get me out on the bike…
I started dating in mid-November, then caught a flu in early December… between those two events, my miles for those two months combined might be 100?—I was hitting 300-600 per month before, and even managed 800+ total, during last BAFS in bystander mode… So, I desperately need to get back into that habit and look forward to this BAFS season nudging me on!!

[Hancockbs]

FS will help ensure I get out and do at least a sleaze ride on those days that riding is not my first choice of things to do.

[Raymo853]

One more thing it will change for me, no longer marking my lunch rides as private.

When I started this job, my CIO and a lot of others did an one hour lunch ride routinely. Unfortunately, the group has stopped for a number of reasons. I go by myself sometimes and was marking the rides as private concerned someone might get judgey.

I am just not done hiding the rides, but will be sending my beacon to my boss for full transparency. (And to further influence him to join me)

[cvcalhoun]

@Raymo853 195372 wrote:

One more thing it will change for me, no longer marking my lunch rides as private.

When I started this job, my CIO and a lot of others did an one hour lunch ride routinely. Unfortunately, the group has stopped for a number of reasons. I go by myself sometimes and was marking the rides as private concerned someone might get judgey.

I am just not done hiding the rides, but will be sending my beacon to my boss for full transparency. (And to further influence him to join me)

You know you can authorize Freezing Saddles to read your private as well as public rides? If you go to http://freezingsaddles.org/authorize, that is one of your choices. At that point, people could see by the number of points that you were riding, but it wouldn’t be obvious where or at what time.

This is not to discourage you from trying to get your boss to ride again. But making your rides public is not a requirement for Freezing Saddles.

[Author]

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