Westchester Biking Group Extends Hand to Lone Cyclists

The summer is ripe with options to simply remain in shape or shed a few extra pounds. Whether you're an accomplished biker or a novice, the Meetup.com group Tri-State, Westchester Mountain Bikers offers the chance to embark on multiple day trips with other biking enthusiasts both within the Eastchester-Tuckahoe-Bronxville region and throughout the tri-state area.

Biking 'meetups' organized via the group's profile are held twice a week on biking trails throughout Westchester County and Long Island, with occasional trips to parks in Connecticut, New Jersey and Pennsylvania.

Headed by organizer and Eastchester native Gary Ferone, the Tri-State Westchester Mountain Bikers boasts more than 270 group members. Co-organizer Bert Negron of the Bronx told Patch the group often functions as a platform through which to network.

"People turn to the Meetup website for social groups and meet up and ride," said Negron. "If you go to the site, you use the search engine, type up mountain biking and you sign up to the some groups that come up. That's basically how your journey begins."

Negron's 12-year personal journey took a drastic turn after a friend and biking compatriot relocated to Pennsylvania for work related reasons. He turned to Meetup.com to find fellow biking devotees with whom he could share his enthusiasm for the sport.

"The whole objective is for people to find riding partners. There are people that generally clip together and ride among themselves and there are an even larger number of people that all know each other. There are communities within communities—we get together in different groups and get to know each other over the course of time," Negron said.

The 3-year-old group, composed mainly of long-time bicyclists who wish to broaden the sense of community within a sport that is often individualistic, has blossomed rapidly under the guidance of Ferone and Negron. Rides attract about two-dozen participants a week.

Members who cannot make the group rides often branch out and organize their own trips in groups of two or three. In May, more than 20 members traveled with Ferone and Negron to a mountain biking resort in Maine for a weekend.

Negron calls the Sprain Ridge County Park in Yonkers his home trail, and recommends it for mountain bikers in the Bronxville-Eastchester-Tuckahoe area due to its proximity.  The park's 278-acres provide labyrinthine mountain bike trails with terrain fit for bicyclists of all levels.

He thinks the Tri-State, Westchester Mountain Bikers Group is important because it gives people a place and opportunity to gather as a community and engage in the sport of mountain biking. "The only other way would be to gain information from your local bike shop," he said.