TRI-STATE TOUR CHICAGO CENTURY
Updates
General Company Wide Updates
Tri-State Tour Chicago Century Specific
Updates for the 2024 Season
12/16/23
- Registration is now open for the 2024 Tri-State
Tour Chicago Century #1 and #2. Click
Here to register!
12/15/23
- The starting location
has changed to Lakefront
Park in Whiting from Forsythe Park in Hammond.
All related information has been updated. Click
Here for more information.
- Free parking for the day will available at the
Mascot Hall of Fame in Whiting, only 0.4
miles away!
- The total length of the route and all related
timing remained exactly the same!
- In order to assist capacity planning, we now
charge a $30.00 late fee for all transportation
services since we may need to charter an additional
bus after the regular registration
deadline.
- The price of the event has increased
by $10.00. Click
Here for more information about
our pricing schedule.
- We now directly accept credit card payments
but will charge a 3.6% surcharge to cover credit
card processing fees. If you do not want to pay
this surcharge you may submit your payment to
us through Zelle or
check or money order instead.
- The price of the event has increased by $10.00
for regular and late registration, and $20.00 for
registration the day of the event. Click
Here for more information about our
pricing schedule.
- The price of the Mechanical Support Plan has
increased by $10.00 if you register during regular
registration, $16.00 if you register during late
registration, and $20.00 if you register the
day of the event.
- Web site updated with 2024 dates.
- The Tri-State Tour Chicago Century #1 will
occur on Sun. July 16th, 2024.
- The Tri-State Tour Chicago Century #2 will
occur on Sat. August 26th, 2024.
Major
Previous Tri-State Tour Chicago Century Specific
Updates
Starting and Stopping Towns
- We are extremely excited to announce that our
ending location has changed to be directly at the
Kenosha supported hotel. Our new ending location
features the following new additional amentities! Click
Here for more information.
- Included services
- Showers
- Swimming pool and whirlpool
- Overnight parking
- Extra services
- A bar and restaurant directly at our
ending location!
The Hammond hotel has changed brands to Days
Inn (previously Econolodge).
- The cut-off dates for the room block reservations
at the Hammond hotel are also the the same as the
regular registration deadlines for both events. Click
Here for more information about the
Hammond hotel.
- The starting location in Hammond has changed
back to Forsythe Park from Wolf Lake Memorial Park.
Free parking at the start will still be available. Click
Here for more information.
- Out of the starting location we
will bike along a brand new bike
path and WE WILL NOT HAVE
TO BIKE DOWN INDIANAPOLIS BLVD. ANYMORE!!!!!!!
We will also ride immediately past
the Indiana state sign - make sure
to stop and get a picture!
- If you are planning on starting your ride from
Chicago, parking for the day is now available
directly at DuSable Harbor. Click
Here for more information.
- Supported in town facilities and services added
for Kenosha, WI. Click
Here for more information.
- Supported in town facilities and services added
for Chicago. Click
Here for more information.
Rest Stops
- Due to a decreased ride distance, Rest Stop 1
in Chicago will now close 15 minutes earlier at
10:00 am.
- DuSable Harbor will now serve as Rest Stop
1, the Chicago starting location, the
return transportation staging point, and the starting
point if you are riding to the Hammond
hotel
the day before the event from Chicago.
All related information has been updated.
- On The Route bicycle shop will no
longer serve as
a supported location for any event services.
Accordingly,
it is very important
that your bicycle
is in great mechanical
working order and ready to be ridden
and you arrive
with all the bike
parts, tools, and cycling accessories you need
since you will no longer be able
to get anything
there during the
event.
- We combined our previous first
two rest
stop locations in Chicago at 31st St. Beach
and Foster
Ave. Beach
into a single rest stop location downtown.
Combining
these two
rest stops into one
has the following
advantages:
- You will have even more time
to make it to Kenosha within our route
cut-off
times because
you'll have one less stop to make
- It eliminates the confusion
at the 31st St. rest stop due to overlapping
marks
for participants
travelling north on the Lakefront bike
path on
the Bicycle Illinois
event
- It makes the first ride overall
ride segment shorter for participants
who don't
bother stopping at
the 31st Street rest stop because it's
so close
to the start.
- This change significantly improves
our ability to ensure support service
coverage
along the
entire
route.
- Rest Stop 2 has changed to Skokie from Morton
Grove. Click
Here for more information.
- Rest Stop 4 in Waukegan is now at the Waukegan
Harbor from Dugdale Park. Click
Here for more information.
- There is a deli, hot dog stand,
and ice cream stand
directly at Waukegan Harbor.
You will easily be able to purchase
lunch and ice cream
there on your own during
the ride!
Route
- The Kenosha century route will now follow the
north part of the Kenosha
County Bike Trail to Racine. In Racine it
turns around and follows the Kenosha
County Bike Trail south back into Kenosha,
passing right past the Kenosha
Velodrome back to the ending location.
- The route now follows a designated
bike path along the "New
Lake Shore Drive" from 93rd
to 79th St. through the former
U.S. Steel
South
Works.
- We now follow the North Shore
Channel Trail and the Green
Bay Trail before and after Rest Stop 2 instead
of the
North
Branch Trail.
- We now follow the North Shore Channel
Trail and Green Bay Trail through
Lincolnwood, Skokie, Evanston, Wilmette,
Kenilworth, and Winnetka instead of the North
Branch Trail Place through Niles,
Morton Grove, Glenview, and Northfield.
- The only option to follow the road or a bike
path will be from Waukegan to Kenosha.
- The Robert McClory bike path into Kenosha
has been paved beginning at the Wisconsin
state line. As a result all routes will now follow
it to the end of the ride (including
the century
option), making the route safer and
easier to follow. Unfortunately the Robert McClory
bike path still has a crushed limestone
surface
through Illinois, so we will continue
to offer a fully paved on road alternative to
this part
of the bike path.
Ride Itinerary
- A closing time of 10:00 am and
12:45 pm has been added to Rest Stop 1 (Chicago)
and Rest Stop 2 (Skokie). The closing time of
Rest Stop 3 (Lake Forest) has been changed to
3:15 pm. The closing time for Rest Stop 3 (Waukegan)
is still the same at 4:45 pm and the overall
route closing time is still 6:30 pm. Click
Here for more information.
- Information added about minimum average paces
and latest departure times for specific routes. Click
Here for more information.
- The route opening time from the Whiting, IN
starting location has been moved back 15 minutes
to 7:15 am in order
to
allow more time for riders to ride to the starting
location from the 95th/Dan Ryan CTA L Train
Station. This will also allow some more time
for breakfast for participants staying at the
Hammond hotel.
Arriving at the Start of the Event
- We are extremely excited to now offer transportation
service to the Hammond hotel from both Kenosha
and downtown Chicago for you, your bicycle, and
your baggage the day before the start of the
event! Click
Here for more information!
- You can now start your ride directly from
Rest Stop 1 in downtown Chicago instead
of just from Whiting, IN. Click
Here for more information.
- If you do not have a car or another way to
get to the start of the event, you
can now ride there
- On the morning of the event, you can
ride to the Whiting, IN starting
location from the 95th/Dan Ryan CTA L Train
Station. We will be coordinating a
group ride from there to the Whiting, IN
starting location at 6:00
am. Click
Here for more information.
- The day before the event, you can ride
to the Hammond hotel
from the 95th/Dan Ryan CTA L Train Station
or rest stop
1 in downtown Chicago. Click
Here for more information.
- We will not be offering baggage pick up or
delivery service to any of our supported hotels
for any participant who is not continuing from
Bicycle Illinois. If you are riding to the
start of the event you will to carry your personal
bag with you on your bike while riding. Click
Here for more information.
- The route from the supported hotel to the
starting location now follows
many bike paths, reducing busier highway riding
and making
it much safer and more scenic.
Departing
from the End of the Event
- You can now end your ride early in Waukegan
by taking the Metra
train back to Chicago from Rest
Stop 4. You can also still
complete a century
ride by riding back to Waukegan
from Kenosha. Click
Here for
more information.
- You can also easily take a Metra Train
back into downtown Chicago.
The Lake Forest Metra
train station is a very
short ride from rest stop 3 in Lake Forest and
cue sheets and
maps there are available. Click
Here for more information.
Transportation Services
- We have added "e-bike" as an additional
option for the type of bike you will be transporting.
There will be an additional $30.00 fee to transport
e-bikes on our transportation service each way.
This is because e-bikes generally require special
handling and care since they are are typically
heavier and/or take up more room in our vehicles
than standard upright bicycles and therefore
cannot be transported on any outside roof racks
and must be transported inside a support vehicle.
- There will be an additional $30.00 fee to transport
bicycles that require special
handing and care (recumbents, e-bikes, tandems, etc.) on any transportation
service. However a tandem bicycle will not incur
an additional fee if both people riding it register
for the same transportation service.
- We are extremely excited to now offer transportation
service to the Hammond hotel from both Kenosha
and downtown Chicago for you, your bicycle, and
your baggage the day before the start of the
event! Click
Here for more information!
- Our transportation staging point in Chicago
will now be at the supported hotel. Click
Here for more information.
- If you parked your car for the day at Dusable
Harbor for the day, you will need to walk
or bike there from the hotel yourself. To
do so you will follow the fully lighted and
paved Chicago Riverwalk bike path and you
will not need to bike on any downtown street
at all. Directions and a map will be provided.
Event Schedule
- In order to accommodate our new Bike
Wisconsin events, the Tri-State Tour Chicago
Century #2 will now always occur on the fourth
Saturday
in August, the day after the new
Bicycle Illinois recurring schedule. The Tri-State
Tour Chicago Century #1 will now occur on a
Sunday in order to give people who normally
work on Saturdays
the chance to participate in one of the events. Click
Here for more information about
the future event dates.
- Tri-State Tour Chicago Century #1 will be
held on a Sunday to give people who normally
work
on Saturdays
a better chance to participate. Tri-State Tour
Chicago Century #2 will occur on the Saturday
the day after Bicycle Illinois.
Other Event Services
- The late registration fee has increased by
$5.00 from $25.00 to $30.00.
- If you register using a paper registration
form:
- You can now submit your payment through Zelle.
- We no longer have incoming fax service
so you can't send us a copy of your completed
form this way any more.
- If you sign up for the Mechanical Support Plan,
you will need to specifically request the pre-ride
inspection yourself as we will not be able
to search out each participant individually to
provide
it.
- Registration procedures for postponed 2020
participants posted. Unfortunately, we can
only allow postponed 2020 participants to register
for an event at
the original 2020 pricing schedule one time. Click
Here for more information.
- No refunds will be issued in the event we
are unable to run an event due to circumstances
beyond our control. These circumstances include
but are not limited to disasters (natural and/or
manmade), pandemics, war, acts of terrorism,
government regulations, strikes, civil disorder,
curtailment of transportation facilities, or
acts of God. (Force Majure)
- The new official name of the event is now the Tri-State
Tour Chicago Century!
- Only online registration will be available
four weeks before the start of the event in order
to assure that we receive all of your information
and payment in a timely manner due to laspes
in mail service. Click
Here for more information.
- WE
NO LONGER ISSUE ANY REFUNDS AT ANY TIME FOR
ANY REASON. If you do not
participate and would like a refund you
MUST purchase an individual travel insurance
plan, which will reimburse you
according to the plan coverage. Click
Here for more information about
our refund policy.
- The regular registration deadline for both the
Tri-State Tour Chicago Century #1 and #2 is
now only one week before the start of each event.
- We now allow trikes (any bicycle with three
or more wheels) to participate in our events.
However, all participants riding trikes must
provide their own on road support for them at
all times because we cannot guarantee that we
will be able to easily or quickly transport them
off the road in any support vehicle in case of
mechanical breakdown. In addition, we still cannot
accomodate any trikes on any of our transportation
services. Click
Here for more information.
- Each baggage item to be delivered to Waukegan
must be identified by two separate
Waukegan baggage delivery tags
so we can easily identify which
baggage
items should
be delivered there. Click
Here for more information.
- A personalized Certificate of Completion will
no longer be available.
- Based on participant
feedback we will no longer offer
the same box lunches we had previously offered
for any of our events and currently
will not serve any type of lunch on the
road.
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