Where to live/cycling routes in DC?

[kgreene10]

I'm moving to Washington DC for Sept-Dec.

Although my choice of furnished sublets might be locationally limited, can anyone tell me what the best parts of town are for access to road riding routes?

Ideally, I would have quick access to routes that would allow me to do up to 20 min intervals without stopping and take no longer than about 20-30 min to ride there during the week. On the weekends, I don't mind taking longer to get out of town and would like to be able to do 60-70 mile rides.

If you have suggestions about riding routes too, that would be helpful. I know DC reasonably well, but haven't ridden in the area.

Thanks!

[weiwentg]

www.potomacpedalers.org for out of town on the weekends. they also have a Wednesday night ride.

www.thebikerackdc.com hosts a Sunday ride. moderate pace out of town, hammerfest up the MacArthur hill, and then potentially longer rides.

[anomaly]

If you don't ride the White's Ferry loop you are really selling yourself short.

[flydhest]

Where are you going to be working? Does the commute matter a lot?

I live in the District. The further north and west in the District you live, the better is it for biking. Being near Rock Creek Park provides a great place to ride, do hill intervals, and get out of the District into less congested riding. Being toward or west of Georgetown provides access to Macarthur Boulevard and good riding through Maryland.

I am not a fan of the riding in Maryland to the east of the District or the riding in Virginia close in to the District. Further out in either direction, however, can be extraordinarily lovely, but requires getting there.

The Bike Rack ride that was referenced is a reasonable one. I am actually the person that founded that ride and led it for several years before giving it up to a mixture of work, family, and racing demands. It is less organized these days, but people still enjoy it.

There is a lot of cycling in the area, though. What level cyclist are you?

For the type of riding you list, living near the escape routes could mean living in the District and still getting in nice 60 to 70 mile rides, riding from your front door. If you live in a Maryland suburb north/northwest of the District, even more so.

[robin3mj]

I'd recommend using the Key Bridge as a hypothetical starting point to accessing the good roads, and go from there.

MacArthur Blvd takes you up to Falls Road and beyond where the roads really empty out (relatively speaking) and the riding gets nice.

For instance, from my old house in Arlington, up to the entrance of Great Falls and back via Persimmon Tree, it was almost exactly 30 miles, which is a great distance to either hammer out a nice quick ride, or the build off it by heading NW from there.

[scooter]

Military Road/North Glebe in Arlington. Accessable to sublet opportunities along the Rosslyn to Ballston corridor on metro's Orange line.

[ultraman6970]

1st thing... you will hate the traffic.

2nd thing... if you buy stuff from CL please be willing to get off darn DC, why? because all the suckers from DC usually (with the exception of Darius) aren't willing to move their asses off their houses. Even have the face to invite you to their house for delivery of the items after asking you a 40% discount in the price.

3rd, please dont become a darn hispter, would be painfull to see you drilling brake holes in track bikes and doing stupidity because you think you know what are you doing with the bikes.

4th, if you are into old bikes there is one store that worth to go to, if you want to go let me know because is pretty low profile and full of greatness. Bring money with you that day too.

5th... if you want to ride the WOD trail let me know, always good to ride with forumites, maybe others want to come aswell???

Good luck :D

[maximus]

DC is full of great riding. There are loops both around the district to the north (Capital Crescent) and South (Shirlington Loop). DC is slowly growing its biking infrastructure and includes a couple routes north through the district (14th street for example). There is also lots of riding in Rock Creek Park. One of my favorites might be to head south along the river to Mount Vernon. Head west on the Custis trail and I'll ride out with you to meet up with Ultraman at Velo Classique in Purceville (about 40 miles). From what Ultraman tells me we will not only be drenched in sweat - but also drool over vintage steel.

All in all its not at all a bad place to live or ride.

[MattTuck]

I used to travel to DC a lot. One thing we did several times was to ride on the multi-use trail next to the canal. It starts in Georgetown, I think. It wasn't paved, but that was 6-8 years ago. I think the trail itself was pretty long, maybe 15 miles?

I don't think it would be a good place to do intervals, unless it was early in AM and/or on uncrowded sections.

[ultraman6970]

Hot chicks at Rock Creek Park :D

[echelon_john]

Longer than that! More like 185! Goes all the way up to Cumberland, MD. I did the whole thing on the last day of a ride across the U.S.--a memorable longest day ever on a bike; 185 miles in around 14 hours...surreal to leave Cumberland at 4am and be eating Indian food in Georgetown that night!

I used to travel to DC a lot. One thing we did several times was to ride on the multi-use trail next to the canal. It starts in Georgetown, I think. It wasn't paved, but that was 6-8 years ago. I think the trail itself was pretty long, maybe 15 miles?

I don't think it would be a good place to do intervals, unless it was early in AM and/or on uncrowded sections.

[tuxbailey]

http://bikewashington.org/routes/on-road.htm

[kgreene10]

OP here. Thanks for all the great suggestions. I will have to consult a map to get a sense of where the suggested routes are relative to DC neighborhoods.

To answer a few good questions that came up, I'll have an office in the Ronald Reagan Office Building, it would be great to be near a Metro wherever I live, and I'm a 43 year old Cat 4 racer on the cusp of moving up (fingers crossed). No worries about me becoming a hipster -- been there, done that. Now I just want to tear the legs off other middle-aged guys and I hope that my DC responsibilities will give me enough time to train.

Please keep the great suggestions coming.

[scooter]

To keep the work commute short (work stop Federal Triangle on blue/orange line) look for sublets close in DC adjacent to metro - like Foggy Bottom, Cleveland Park. Or, Northern Virginia between Rosslyn and Ballston on orange line. Or, bike to work from locations adjacent to bike trails/routes.

Rides
DC - Hains Point (has some group rides), Rock Creek Park, MacArthur Blvd

[djg]

I'm moving to Washington DC for Sept-Dec.

Although my choice of furnished sublets might be locationally limited, can anyone tell me what the best parts of town are for access to road riding routes?

Ideally, I would have quick access to routes that would allow me to do up to 20 min intervals without stopping and take no longer than about 20-30 min to ride there during the week. On the weekends, I don't mind taking longer to get out of town and would like to be able to do 60-70 mile rides.

If you have suggestions about riding routes too, that would be helpful. I know DC reasonably well, but haven't ridden in the area.

Thanks!

So, there are plenty of options for riding (and training) in town, but I'm not sure about what you're looking for. 20-minute intervals without stopping, within a 20-30 minute ride of downtown are almost non-existent, unless you ride early and are prepared to run stop signs. There's north out of town up Old Anglers, but I'm not sure I recall where the stop signs before the hill are. Maybe you can do it on the Capital Crescent trail if you go early or late -- in decent weather at a reasonable hour of day it is just too crowded for intervals; and on weekends it can get horrendously crowded. OTOH, at odd hours, when it is empty, it's a great little stretch of MUT. Going uphill (very gentle slope) you can probably grab 5-6 miles without a stop sign or a light. Lots of folks do laps around Hains Point (on the river, accessible to downtown), where the main loop is just over 3 miles. Dead flat, smooth roads, and -- apart from Cherry Blossom time -- very little traffic if you go early or late. But making that lap continuous so that you can do 2, hard, non-stop, means running 3 stop signs per lap. Which is not lawful. Lately, they've been clamping down on that (although maybe not at 6AM). Rock Creek Park is great, but again, you'll hit stop signs way before 20 minutes and there might be a fair bit of traffic to contend with, depending on the time.

In town, I'd say somewhere around Rock Creek Park (maybe Woodley Park, Cleveland Park, or Mt. Pleasant); across the river is Arlington, VA.

There's a MUT that runs 40-plus miles west from DC (from the VA side), which can take you to some nice country roads. If you are willing to drive an hour, there are all sorts of things -- Skyline in VA, stuff around Thurmont in Maryland, etc.

[ultraman6970]

The skyline road is awesome but you have to go with at least with support with water and stuff... I wouldnt drink the water of the fountains around :D

Well looks like maximus is willing to show up his EM in a ride, that's good. Im old and overweight so I can't ride fast at all, but i can coast behind w/o any problem :D The WOD is fun to ride, has a little bit of everything.

[palincss]

Alexandria VA is one of the best places to live in the metro DC area if you want to commute to work by bicycle. My neighborhood (Del Ray) is near the Braddock Rd metro, and you can ride Commonwealth Ave to the Mount Vernon trail over 14th St bridge, up Raoul Wallenberg to the Mall and north on 14th to the Ronald Reagan building. People pay money to visit DC so they can ride that commute.

[zap]

snip

can anyone tell me what the best parts of town are for access to road riding routes?

Ideally, I would have quick access to routes that would allow me to do up to 20 min intervals without stopping and take no longer than about 20-30 min to ride there during the week. On the weekends, I don't mind taking longer to get out of town and would like to be able to do 60-70 mile rides.

Thanks!

Metro red line to North Bethesda, Maryland.

Clara Barton Parkway is best for controlled 20 minute efforts during the week though not during rush hour, so mid-day only. I live in Potomac (4 miles west of North Bethesda) and the location is great as I can either ride into town or head out without stopping at a single stop light if I wish.

Be careful what you wish for. At 43 you are young so watch out for 50 something cat 2's who regularly do 40K TT in the 52 minute range.

[Gummee]

I was at the Fresh Bikes/Conte's ride last nite. Mmmm free food! There were a LOT of cyclists out.

There seem to be lots of folks in Arlington that ride down the hill to get to work based on the # of people that rode to the ride.

I've lived in Alex and the path next to the GW Parkway is a great ride, but don't plan on doing intervals. Last I heard, they had 'cops' monitoring speeds. Again, FWI've heard, they've made it illegal to ride ON the parkway.

The W&OD trail system is great for moving about, but again, don't plan on intervals on it. Its a MUT with all that that implies.

Hains (sp?) Point has a lunch ride that will rip your legs off, but watch out for busses. I've heard of another ride in the PMs led by some of the older 'regulars' from the lunch ride, so ask around once you get here.

If you ride/race cross, the mid-atlantic is one of the hotbeds. The 3/4 fields were easily 125 people last fall. I doubt they'll get much smaller this fall.

If ya wanna come ride out in the cowfields, let me know. I'm out SW of Manassas.

M

[rccardr]

Fairfax County Parkway and Rt 123 in VA also have paved bike paths running alongside. Some decent hills on them, as well. If you get out that way let me know and I'll show you some cut-throughs in low traffic residential areas with good interval setups.

There's also a ride out of the Swiss Bakery on Old Keene Mill Rd. in Burke, leaves 8am Saturday morning. It's about 35 miles, down to Occoquan and back- a fast bunch of guys & you'll get a good workout.

[cosmonaut]

To answer a few good questions that came up, I'll have an office in the Ronald Reagan Office Building
I work across the street from the RRB. If you'll be commuting via bike to your office and are up for some pre-work miles, send me a PM.

[andywills]

I don't know a ton about DC or interval / after work routes, but a friend of mine has a blog that basically posts fun weekend rides you can get to from the metro. Check it out:

http://twowheelsnotsix.wordpress.com/

[palincss]

Clara Barton Parkway is best for controlled 20 minute efforts during the week though not during rush hour, so mid-day only.



Cycling is not allowed on the Clara Barton Parkway.

[zap]

Cycling is not allowed on the Clara Barton Parkway.

Officially it's been allowed/not allowed but really it's ok kind of deal. Used every day by cyclists.

[djg]

I was at the Fresh Bikes/Conte's ride last nite. Mmmm free food! There were a LOT of cyclists out.

There seem to be lots of folks in Arlington that ride down the hill to get to work based on the # of people that rode to the ride.

I've lived in Alex and the path next to the GW Parkway is a great ride, but don't plan on doing intervals. Last I heard, they had 'cops' monitoring speeds. Again, FWI've heard, they've made it illegal to ride ON the parkway.

The W&OD trail system is great for moving about, but again, don't plan on intervals on it. Its a MUT with all that that implies.

Hains (sp?) Point has a lunch ride that will rip your legs off, but watch out for busses. I've heard of another ride in the PMs led by some of the older 'regulars' from the lunch ride, so ask around once you get here.

If you ride/race cross, the mid-atlantic is one of the hotbeds. The 3/4 fields were easily 125 people last fall. I doubt they'll get much smaller this fall.

If ya wanna come ride out in the cowfields, let me know. I'm out SW of Manassas.

M

That Freshbikes (Conte's) Tuesday evening hill ride is a good ride, btw, if the OP ends up in NW DC, or Arlington, or accessible parts of Alexandria (or if others are interested). Free food is only the first T of the month, but it's a good weekly ride, both an A & B version.

[rallizes]

If you are willing to drive an hour, there are all sorts of things -- Skyline in VA, stuff around Thurmont in Maryland, etc.

I might be in DC for March. Are you familiar with how Skyline might be this time of year for road riding?

Any thoughts appreciated.

[verticaldoug]

What about Squadra Coppi Sunday ride?
squadracoppi.com
dcpaceline.com

These are what the guys at Revolution Cycles in Georgetown recommended.

[zap]

I might be in DC for March. Are you familiar with how Skyline might be this time of year for road riding?

Any thoughts appreciated.

Watch the weather forecasts. We've had snow as late as mid March. Figure 5-10 degrees colder than D.C.

Bring a light just in case a ranger asks to see if you have one.