more Ups than downs

Published 4:00 pm Wednesday, March 2, 2005

The Chilly Hilly brings a record number of riders, including a reinvigorated Ernie Franz.

It took something bright to burn off the fog Sunday morning.

Maybe it was Ernie Franz’ grin.

Critically injured by a drunk driver while riding last August, the one-time bicycle commuter returned to two wheels for the 33rd annual Chilly Hilly ride around Bainbridge Island.

Franz rode shotgun for physical therapist Keith Heizelman, on a recumbent tan­­dem bicycle loaned by another friend. He still needed the aid of a walker to get from his van to the bike, but after that, the only thing Franz worried about was staying upright on some of the island’s more no­torious inclines.

“It feels great, and feels quite stable,” Franz said. “It’s just exciting to be out. I can’t believe we’re doing this, after coming home (from a care center) just two months ago.”

It was a memorable day for both organizers and riders, who turned out in record numbers for the 33-mile ride sponsored by the Cascade Bicycle Club of Seattle. The first riders rolled off the ferry at 8:30 a.m., greeted by a hanging fog, but that gave way to blue skies for the later entrants.

Turnout estimated at perhaps 4,800 riders easily bested the previous high mark of 4,028, set in 1995, and left last year’s participation of around 3,700 somewhere back over the horizon.

Cascade marketing director Scott Marlow credited the slow ski season and a week of unseasonally mild weather for the fulsome showing.

“It’s been sunny and real temperate,” he said, “and people have been getting out the bikes a lot earlier.”

There is also what Marlow termed “the Lance Factor,” as more people are motivated by the popularity and success of perennial bicycling champion Lance Armstrong. Last weekend’s Seattle Bike Expo, a trade fare, saw a record number of exhibitors and 20 percent more people come through the turnstiles, Marlow noted.

Bedecked in the kaleidoscopic fashions endemic to the sport, Sunday’s riders were in high spirits throughout.

Stealing the scene at the outset were the Seattle Area Riders, a group whose numbers – 10 – equaled the wheels among them. Each trundled off the ferry astride a robust unicycle, whose 36-inch pneumatic tires were said to the largest in production.

The display provoked frivolity from other participants, including mock-serious exclamations like, “Hey! You’ve only got one wheel!”

“Did you make that up yourself?” one unicyclist rejoined, while another said drily, “Ask us where the other one is.”

Unicyclist Steve DeKoekkoek of Seattle said the biggest challenges would be the amount of “saddle time,” and the lack of gearing over the undulating course.

“It’s the equivalent to riding in ‘granny gear’ the whole time,” he said.

Volunteers lined the course at key intersections, directing traf­fic and steering riders to the correct turnoffs. Kathy Doll of Bainbridge Youth Services stood at the top of Peterson Hill Road – a punishing grade that forced many riders to walk – with a sign reading, “You’re Looking Great!”

“This is a nice place to be at,” Doll said, “because they’re all ready to die. You can tell ’em, ‘you made it.’”

The achievement may have been the most notab le for Franz, who with Heizelman went into the morning strengthened by four or five training rides and perhaps 100 miles on the tandem.

Franz – who used to do the Chilly Hilly route once a week as a time trial – set out with an entourage of more than a dozen friends and well-wishers, support he described as “amazing.”

He was, he said, undaunted by last year’s accident.

“I think what happened was a pretty freak thing,” Franz said, although he admitted, “It’s probably good that I don’t remember being hit, because then there might be some hesitancy about getting back on a bike.”