Just a heads-up that weekday evening rides that start at 6:30 p.m. will start at 6:00 p.m. beginning Monday, September 2 in order to steal a little additional daylight. Rides that have been starting at 6:00 p.m. will keep on keeping on.

And just a little advance heads-up, weekend rides will switch to a 10 a.m. start beginning September 21 and continue through the end of the riding season. We chose mid-September as the time of year when we need to let the world warm up a bit longer in the morning. See you at the ride.

Our opening ride of the season, per tradition, is Sunday, March 17, also known as St. Patrick's Day. The weather is also expected to adhere to tradition. Just warm and dry enough to ride. The ride start is from Ellicott Creek Island Park parking lot on Creekside Drive at Niagara Falls Boulevard. Two short, flat rides are offered for your early season riding pleasure. We roll at 11 a.m.

Highlights of the year to come include two new party rides, one July 13 from Mike Viggato's house in East Aurora, the other at Sandy Bunn's ranch in Eden, date TBD. Mike Maher will host his traditional Labor Day picnic at his house in Lakeview, preceded by one week by our annual club picnic at Como Lake Park. Jim Vozga has retired from his usual Memorial Day party ride but will be ride leader for the regular holiday Monday ride out of Clarence.

We will also inaugurate a series of nine (9) weekend rides to be held jointly with our friends from the Buffalo Bicycling Club. They wanted to do more group rides and came to us as the experts. They'll offer us some new routes and we'll show BBCers what life after bike racing can be. We will also use this as an opportunity to develop some pace line discipline with groups A through D (and E if necessary) with a pace group for most everyone. Remember: the purpose of a pace line is not to drop riders but for everyone to move more efficiently. See the schedule for details on these rides starting Sunday, April 7 and throughout the season. We will be adding short versions for those who like that.

Our Wednesday night rides, north out of Swormville and south from Chestnut Ridge Park, will also include riders from the BBC with routes curated by your regular NFBC leaders, Jason Deckert and Karen Alongi and me, Bradshaw Hovey. For NFBC members, all of these rides will be the same as before -- same sign-in, cue sheets, files on our website, after-ride socializing -- just with some new friends in attendance.

Also on tap are a couple of rides to promote further sociability including a 2 p.m. ride on Friday, March 29 -- Good Friday; Sunday, May 5 for Cinco de Mayo to take advantage of the party there in Hamburg; and a reprise of "Bruce's Reach the Beach" at 2 p.m. Sunday June 2 as an all-club ride with an option for dinner afterward.

It is fair for members to make requests. Peg Walker has volunteered to lead the Maple Country Ride on Saturday, April 13 with a stop for pancakes at Moore's Maple Shack and Pancake House, Galen Hill Road in Freedom, NY. We put that on the schedule. I have also heard suggestions for a renewal of the Friday night Grand Island circuit. We are open to suggestions. It's also not oo late for someone to volunteer to organize a club trip. Mike Maher and Michelle Smith put together a great one last year to Xenia, OH. You could do one too.

Then there are all those other rides: Ride for Roswell, Empire State Ride, Hospice Gran Fondo, Ride for Missing and Exploited Children, Tour de Perry, Tour de Teddy, The Highlander, Bon Ton Roulet, East Aurora to Ellicottville, and more. Get your club kit and go represent. The NFBC team store at Jakroo.com is still open. And Bradshaw has matching socks at the still low-low price of $6 a pair.