With the third month of the National Bike Challenge in the books, Allen County continues to roll up an impressive performance.

Allen County now has 69 riders signed up, and we’ve ridden 18,698 miles since May 1st, on pace for over 30,000 miles in the five-month challenge period (May 1 through September 30).

Our local challenge remains #1 in Kansas, and #3 in the entire country. The two local challenges ahead of us are located in large urban areas, so that makes us the top rural bicycling county in the country!

We reached a pretty significant milestone this month, with our participation rate surpassing 0.5%, meaning that more than 1 out of every 200 people in Allen County are taking part. That may not sound overly impressive, but it’s nearly an order of magnitude greater than any other county in Kansas. And we know we’ve reached only a small portion of the people who regularly ride bikes in Allen County, so there’s plenty of room to grow! If you know someone who bikes, but isn’t yet participating in the National Bike Challenge, be sure to share the good word…

Our individual communities are also continuing to log the miles:

• Iola is the #72 city nationwide, and #3 in the state of Kansas. 52 Iola riders have logged 13417 miles so far. Iola is the #1 city in Kansas among communities with population 5000 to 49,999.
• Humboldt is the #114 city nationwide, and #6 in the state of Kansas. 14 Humboldt riders have logged 4261 miles so far. Humboldt is the #4 city in Kansas among communities with population 500 to 4,999.
• La Harpe is the #156 city nationwide, and #9 in the state of Kansas. 1 La Harpe rider has logged 906 miles so far.
• Moran is the #1137 city nationwide, and #41 in the state of Kansas. 2 Moran riders have logged 114 miles so far.

We’re still searching for our first riders from Elsmore, Gas, Mildred, Petrolia, and Savonburg.

In July, the top 5 riders in Allen County were:

• Randy Rasa: 31 days, 1704 points
• Steven Garver: 31 days, 1026 points
• Terry Broyles: 14 days, 848 points
• Tom Woodworth: 13 days, 779 points
• Jay Kretzmeier: 11 days, 756 points

If you’re looking to get started biking, or are hoping to find some friends to bike with, check out the two regular group rides on the Southwind Rail Trail: The “F.O.B. Mob” ride meets at 6pm Tuesdays at the Humboldt trailhead for a ride to the Iola Dairy Queen and back. On Thursday evenings, a group meets at 6:30pm at Cofachique Park in Iola for a ride to Humboldt and back. Additional show-and-go rides are scheduled on an irregular, informal basis on other days during the week.

And remember, if you have some miles that you’ve forgotten to log, it’s easy to go back and add them. Just log in to your account at NationalBikeChallenge.org, navigate to your personal profile page, scroll down to the calendar, click on the day(s) you need to change, and edit as needed.

For those who’ve not yet signed up for the National Bike Challenge, come on and join in on the fun! Get started at NationalBikeChallenge.org. It’s free!