On Saturday, August 15, 15 people from around the east coast of the US and Canada showed up at the Northampton Airport in Northampton Massachusetts for the ride portion of the first New England Velomobile and Human Powered Vehicle Rally. Coming from as far away as West Virginia and Ontario, Canada, we were gathering to celebrate human powered vehicles as a practical, fun, healthful and environmentally responsible form of personal transportation (alright, maybe that is a bit high minded, but it is a good description of why I organized this event). Since velomobiles are extremely rare in the US, I hoped to offer people interested in these machines a chance to actually experience them first hand.

Four of us drove down from Maine together - my wife, Elyse, and baby daughter Abby in our Corolla wagon with the Alligt Alleweder (with the last few rivets pulled the night before) on the roof, followed by Karl Stewart (of Back Bay Bicycles in Portland) with my Flevobike Alleweder and a Burley Django short wheel based recumbent in the bed of his truck. We were hoping to leave in time to get to Northampton before dark but ended up arriving there at about 10:00 PM. It wasn't at all clear where we were supposed to set up, so after walking around the airport in the dark and then driving around we decided to set up camp in a likely looking spot (away from the runway). I had the tent halfway up when a guy drove up in a pickup and said we were in the wrong spot, that the car show was over behind the airplane hangers. So we thanked him moved our stuff over behind the airplane hangers - and right next to I-91! It was a bit of a noisy night, but we managed to sleep (or at least I did :) ).

The next morning we woke up to extremely bright skies - a beautiful morning for the Rally! I decided to take the Alleweder out for a quick spin down to the (Connecticut) River for a quick dunk. So I pedaled over and turned onto the road paralleling the river trying to find a good access point. It seemed strange to me that Dick Giusto, the owner of the Airport when I had first set up the Rally there, indicated that the camping spot was right next to the river and that it was possible to walk down and take a swim. The pavement turned to gravel and a couple of hundred yards later I looked to my left and saw a tent with a yellow Mango velomobile next to it, and further down another tent with a white machine - which I recognized from pictures as one of Reg Rodaro's Stormy Weather velomobiles. Cool! So this was our campground - exactly what I had hoped for! The fellow in the tent near the Mango was stirring and waved, so I pedaled down a short slope into the campground. It was Johannes Groessbrink of Northeast Recumbents in Verona, NJ with his new velomobile. We chatted for a minute and I proceeded down to the end of the campground where I found a nice little trail that led right down to the river. I waded in and splashed around for a couple of minutes before wading ashore and drying off. It was time to get set up for the rally.

I pedaled back to where we had camped and shortly afterward a guy in a pickup truck drove over and told us that there would be a car show where we were camped and that the velomobiles were "over there by the river." So we thanked him and started packing up to move over by Johannes and Reg.

A few minutes later Johannes pedaled up in his Mango. We talked for awhile and looked at the modified drivetrain of Johannes' Mango before I continued packing.

photo courtesy Karl Stewart

A few minutes later TC "Chuck" Hazzard also from Maine pedaled up in his Mango.

Elyse and I headed over to the Rally site and started setting up. Then I pedaled off to set up a couple of signs to point people to the Rally site - while I was working on them by the Airport office, a number of different people came up looking for the Rally - two in cars and one on a bike towing a very large cargo trailer. I pointed them to the proper location and when finished with my task pedaled back to see how things were shaping up.

The official start time for the Rally ride was 10:00, but to allow people from far away a little extra time, we waited until approximately 10:30 to start the Rally ride.

Craig Della Penna - the local expert on Rail-Trails had agreed to lead us on a guided tour of the Norwottock Rail Trail, and after giving a short presentation on the trails and cycling environment in Northampton we headed out to the Trailhead. At the Trailhead, Craig paused for a few minutes to give an interesting talk about the Nortwottock trail.

We proceeded out for about 10 miles at a leisurely pace, enjoying the weather and the nice scenery. A couple of times we paused and Craig provided some more background on several aspects of the railroad history of the Norwottock and it's rebirth as a source of enjoyment for thousands of non-motorized recreators each year (yeah, many of them drive to the trailhead, but it is a step in the right direction).

photo courtesy Karl Stewart

The ride proceeded at a leisurely pace on the outbound leg, but since it was getting late for lunch, several of us turned it up a few notches for the return leg and had a rather brisk ride - fun!

Thanks for leading a great ride, Craig! At this point many of us were quite hungry and thirsty - prior to the rides, we had taken orders for Subway and Elyse went to get these while we were out riding (thanks Elyse!) It was very nice to have the sandwiches and drinks waiting for us to get back. So after lunch, during which some people were test riding some of the machines that were there, we rolled down into the campsite closest to the road for the Expo portion of the Rally.

photo courtesy Karl Stewart

After taking a few group pictures, several of us gave talks on our velomobiles. I talked about the velombile concept in general, and the benefits offered by riding fully faired - weather protection, the potential for improved aerodynamics and speed at a given effort level over a similar unfaired cycle, improved crash protection, etc. Then I talked about the Alleweders, discussed the construction technique and the availability of kits from Alligt and completed Alleweders from Velomobile USA in Texas.

Reg Rodaro had a 7 hour drive ahead of him to get back to his home in Canada and needed to leave, so he went next and talked about his experiences developing the Stormy Weather series of velomobiles over the course of about 13 years. He had started working with composites building a sailboat and from the time he had built his first VM, had build a number of them, making improvements through trial and error. His current VM is a tub style monococque construction with a mid drive that routes the chain to the left rear wheel. He had some interesting refinements such as a front Lexan windshield that slid up and down in aluminum channel and a lever adjustable vent that directed air across the windshield. He used two different types of clear plastic in the zippable soft sides to his rig. One of the nice aspects of his machine is the ability to be fully enclosed when necessary for very cold weather , while retaining the ability to be almost completey opened very quickly for times when it was warm. His machine seemed well suited for the very wide variety of riding conditons found in his climate. Reg let us know that he was willing to help others to avoid some of the mistakes that he had made along the way - Thanks Reg!

Johannes Groessbrink went next and told us about the Mango velomobile that he had recently obtained. Mangos are built with a partially load bearing fiberglass body with an aluminum subframe. His particular machine was one of the first with a revised drivetrain that was more similar to that found in Velomobiel.nl's first design called the Quest and utilized mid drive (3x8) behind the seat with a chain tensioner in front of the seat. These machines are the result of fairly comprehensive windtunnel testing and are designed so that crosswinds actually help the forward motion of the velomobile. Steven Friedlander had brought a recent copy of Velovison magazine and read portions of an article on velomobiles that mentioned the significant aero advantage of this particular design. The fibeglass body is very thin in portions that are only required to deflect the wind, with reinforcements in the load bearing areas. Thanks Johannes!

Finally, Steven Friedlander gave a talk on his Lightning F-40. This design is a two wheel short wheelbased recumbent which is based on the P38 Lightning production bike. The F-40 configuration entails adding a front fiberglass fairing and a fabric body sock with an aluminum rear portion that provides the aero shape in the rear. The F-40 is intended to be a streetable production streamliner and has been around for quite some time. We mocked up the body sock with Stephen inside which gave us all an idea of how it actually worked. Judging from the stickers on his fairing, Steve would like us to vote libertarian. Thanks Steve!

And that about wrapped it up.

The range of machines seen this year:

let me know if you attended and would like your name and general area (and other information - links, etc.listed.

Johannes Groessbrink of Northeast Recumbents (email: norearec@mindspring.com) in Verona, NJ- Velomobiel.nl Mango,
Chuck Hazzard of Southern Maine- Velomobiel.nl Mango
Ethan Davis - Southern Maine- Alleweders (1 Flevo and 1 Alligt)
Nick Hein - West Virginia - Toureasy Clone
Reg Rodaro Ontario, Canada- Stormy Weather
Sunderland, MA- 3 Runabout Cycles human-electic hybrid trikes
NJ - Lightning F40
Easy Racer Foldrush with Currietech motor and Zzipper fairing
Burley Django - southern Maine
NYC- Windcheetah trike
NYC - Greenspeed trike
1 Giant Comfort bike (not sure the specific name)
1 Optima Baron
Several upright bikes - one with an extra-large cargo trailer which I believe was made by One-Off Titanium.

A number of folks came from a significant distance to check out the Expo - I hope you all found it imformative and fun!

Thanks to all who made it this year - hopefully we'll do it again next year and have twice as many velomobiles and other HPV's!

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Rally T-shirts for sale

I still have a few of the T-shirts that I had printed up for the Rally available. Shirts were also printed without the Rally specific text. Click on the T-shirt thumbnail picture below for more information.

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The Pre Rally Introduction

The number of velomobiles in the USA increased significantly in 2003, but continues to remain extremenly small. Most people, even cycling enthusiasts have no idea that velombiles even exist. It's time to do something about that!

I am organizing the New England Velomobile rally to raise awareness of the velomobile concept and the potential for human powered vehicles as a practical mode of transportation. There are absolutely no restrictions on the types of human powered vehicles that may participate in the rally - except that they must have at least partially human powered drive mechanisms. So all riding positions - recumbent, upright, supine, standing on your head, any number of wheels, power assist , fairings, homebuilt or production, etc., etc. - ALL HPV's ARE WELCOME. The idea is to try to further the development of the VM and practical human powered vehicles in North America, so I'd like very much to see a strong exchange of ideas at the rally, and the greater variety of vehicles that show up, the better!
Significant increase in the use of human powered vehicles as a viable means of personal local transportation would help us in a variety of extremely important ways, including: simultaneously decreasing our dependence on less-than-friendly foreign countries and decreasing our negative impact on the environment, (such as global warming and over-exploitation of resources) making a statement in opposition to the innappropriate, conspicuous consumerism characterized by the ubiquitous SUV, while fighting the obesity epidemic(due in large part to our dependence on the automobile) and it's accompanying negative health effects.

For directions, and to find out more about the Northampton Airport, go to http://www.northamptonairport.com/

Although the emphasis of this event is on velomobiles, all HPV's are welcome.