Silent Sports Sounds Off

Above, exiting the north end of the Stewart Tunnel

Two weekends ago, my intrepid training companion and brother-in-law, Adam, joined me for a 20-mile Badger State Trail ride from Monroe north to Belleville. Officially opened a month earlier, we were happy to encounter more than a dozen other cyclists on a hot and humid Sunday morning.

A handful of those folks we didn’t actually see because they were engulfed by the darkness of the 1,200-foot Stewart Tunnel just south of Belleville. (Note: If you go, bring a headlamp or bike light because the tunnel curves, leaving no visible light at either end for much of it’s span. Spooky but very cool.)

For a more thorough description of the Badger State Trail – expected to become Wisconsin’s most popular rail-trail once completed between Paoli and Madison – look for the September issue of Silent Sports (coming off the presses as I type this). McFarland High School teacher Joe Brady spent two days riding the 34-mile rail-trail to research this five-page feature story.

Here are a few pics I took along the bucolic trail.

When the trail canopy breaks, here’s a typical view.

With increasing bike traffic, can you blame this little guy for having second thoughts about crossing the trail?

The intersection of the north-south Badger State Trail and the east-west Sugar River State Trail south of Monticello – not to mention the BST-Jane Addams Trail linkage at the Wisconsin-Illinois state line – offer many long distance travel options for bicyclists.

Dear fellow silent sportsters,

The Silent Sports Blog has arrived! While the print magazine continues to come out monthly, here you will find more frequently breaking news and views of value to you, a member of the self-propelled masses in the upper Midwest.

• More timely “Sounding (the silent sport) Alarm” action items will be posted here.

• Race updates, cancellation and postponement notices, as well as links to results, will all be made readily available.

• And anything else that piques my (and likely your) interest or prompts collective outrage (while remembering we are restrained and reasonable people, for the most part) will likely rise to the surface, too.

More interactive features will follow, so check back often.

In the mean time, get a taste of the most current issue of the magazine at silentsports.net.

Sincerely,

Joel Patenaude

your pedaling, paddling and pitter-pattering editor