Super Bowl Sunday Up to Flagpole

Football flying through the air on top of Flagpole for the Super Bowl Ride

How many years has the Harrisonburg cycling community ridden up to Flagpole Knob on the day of the big game? 30 plus years? The ride has been a Harrisonburg tradition since before there was a bike club in the area, before mountain bikes were ridden regularly on the trails of Shenandoah Mountain and certainly before there were Fat Bikes designed specifically to gobble up the snowy roads and trails.

Lindsey Carpenter rolling from Meadow Knob over to Pond Knob before riding out to Oak Knob and down Mud Pond

Since 2003 I don't think I have missed a single Super Bowl Sunday ride. A classic winter event, the weather is always variable and conditions never consistent. I've ridden in super cold light fluffy snow where you couldn't stand on Flagpole for more than a few minutes without freezing. I've also ridden in rivers of running water streaming down the Forest Service roads as the snow melts and temperatures push upwards of fifty degrees. Often, the road conditions are something in between with plenty of snow but also treacherous ice as the surface is caught in a freeze thaw cycle. Riders often end up on the ground unknowingly as their wheels lose traction.

The Salsa Mukluk Fat Bike was eating up the snow especially on the Mud Pond downhill

Many of those years I have ridden from town, up the mountain and then back to town. One of those years there was far too much snow to ride up the mountain so we brought a group of 20 folks and skiied up to the top. Well we sort of skiied, we were fortunate enough to have a group of large trucks pull us from the Reddish Knob damn up to the saddle. Skiing down the Pond Knob trail was a treat.

Pushing the Fat Bike up the STEEP climb to Oak Knob with Flagpole looming in the distance

This year, we couldn't be more excited to see several members of the Rocktown Composite team (middle and high school local mountain bike team) pedal all the way to the top of Flagpole. They are well on their way towards many many Super Bowl rides to come. In a classic Harrisonburg tradition, the Super Bowl ride isn't really a group ride but it embodies all that is right and welcoming about the Harrisonburg bike community.

Thomas Jenkins brought a football all the way up the mountain!