Rides & Events Last update: December 20, 2025 We cover only free rides frequented by cyclists who bike for transportation. We don't list sports/rec rides, or any rides that require registration. Those can be found on the Austin Cycling Association website Local Rides Annual Moonlight Cruise This is a huge, unofficial annual ride attracting several hundred riders, and it's been happening since 1982 or 1983. See the left-hand sidebar for the date and time. Remember that a headlight and rear reflector or light is required by State law (and it's crazy to ride at night without lights anyway). By the way, if you like the Moonlight Cruise, you might also like the Houston Moonlight Ramble held every October. Like Austin's ride, it starts at 2:00 am, but their ride is much larger, with anywhere from 5000-12,000 cyclists. Also unlike Austin's ride, it's not free — there's a registration fee. Critical Mass Critical Mass put transportation cycling on the map when it exploded into the scene in September 1992. About 50 riders in San Francisco took to the streets during rush hour with a random, spontaneous route, with the simple idea that bikes have a right to the road. It was an exciting idea for riders who’d spent years feeling marginalized, since they could stake their claim to the street with safety-in-numbers, and know that they were being seen. The ride quickly grew and was copied by hundreds of other cities, including Austin circa October 1993. (It probably would have spread even faster had there been Internet back then.) It was groundbreaking. Municipal Bicycle programs, bike lane planning, lively email discussion lists, and commuter bike advocacy in general can all trace their beginnings back to Critical Mass. That’s not to say that CM was well-received by everyone and without controversy. Drivers weren’t happy about there being extra road users on the streets during rush hour, a feeling exacerbated by the fact that some riders took up all the lanes, and then might have even intentionally rode slowly to cause as much disruption as possible. This wasn’t always the case—CM had a different flavor from city to city, and even in the same city from month to month, depending on which riders showed up. I was excited when CM launched here, because I'd been a bike commuter in a city with no bike community to speak of. There were no other urban rides, no Yellow Bike Project, no nothing. I got my schedule changed at work so I could attend the rides, and I rode on more rides than anyone from around 1993-2000. I also attended rides in other cities like New York, helped the filmmakers making the Bike Like U Mean It documentary (see below), and ran a website listing all the CM rides in the world. CM left from the University of Texas West mall from its inception in 1993 through the 2000s. At some point the start point moved to the Pfluger Bridge, but I don't know if that's current, since the current website hasn't been updated in years. Related: Bike Like U Mean It (2002). Documentary about bike culture in Austin, with a segment on Critical Mass. Driver knocks over CM rider (2001). An impatient driver knocked over a CM rider and narrowly missed killing countless more. See my coverage of the event, including video, letters to the editor, and newspaper reports. Worldwide Directory of CM rides. I ran a website listing all the CM rides in the world from circa 1998-2008. I was excited for the site to be mentioned in Adbusters and linked to by Rage Against the Machine. I think I started the site at CriticalMassHub.com, then switched to CriticalMassRides.info, finally settling on Critical-Mass.info. Other social rides See the sidebar at left (desktop), or under this article (mobile). Organized Rides For other kinds of rides (like where you have to register and pay money and get a t-shirt), see the Austin Cycling Association website. Other Events Bike Month Bike to Work Day (Every May). In the mid-90's, Austin started having a Bike Week to promote cycling, with bike fairs, discounts at local stores for people who biked there, and a Corporate Challenge to see which business could get the highest percentage of its employees to bike to work on the designated day. By the end of the 90's, Bike Week had grown into Bike Month. By 2000, the City's Bicycle Program, which had done most of the organizing of the event in recent years, decided to no longer organize the event, in favor of devoting its resources to more pressing bike projects, and local activists took over organizing the events. In 2025, I notice that Bike Month ATX is the current organizer, but their website doesn't say who they are. For historical purposes, here are some of the events from Bike Months from 1999-2005. FrankenBike Monthly swap meet for bike parts. Calendar of Rides (I used to offer a form for every ride/organization to enter their rides and events into a central database, so every ride/event would be available here and to any other website for one-stop shopping, but I could never interest ride organizers or orgs in entering their rides and events.) Rides & Events posted to our forum Want to get your event listed below? Just post it on the web forum and it will show up here automatically 30 minutes later. Be sure to include the exact date & time of your event in the title, so that shows up too. Don't use relative terms like "tomorrow" or "next Friday" because you don't know when someone will be reading your listing—it could be months or years after your event has already happened. So use the exact, real date and time. World Naked Bike Ride and Full Moon Cruise, Sat October 4th, 9 and 11p (posted 10/2) 43rd Annual Moonlight Cruze Bike Ride Sat night 09/07 2am Pfluger Brdg (posted 9/3) World Naked Bike Ride Austin: June 14th, 2025, Pease Park (posted 6/8) International Ride of Silence 2025 - Wed 05/21 -- Austin City Hall (posted 5/13) 42nd Annual Moonlight Cruze Bike Ride Satu night, 2024-09-14 2:00am (posted 9/7) International Ride of Silence 2024 - Wed 05/15 -- Austin City Hall (posted 5/15) Tour das Hugel Nov 11th, 2023 7am under Mopac at Stratford Drive (posted 11/6) National Walk/Bike to School Day is Oct 4th (posted 9/25) 2023 ATX Naked Bike Ride 09/30 7:15pm Pease Park (posted 9/21) 41st annual "Moonlight Cruze" bicycle ride Sat night, 09/24 2am (posted 9/16) Defunct rides Courteous Mass Bike Parade Following the craziness of the Sept. 2021 ride, Charles McNeil and I started this ride as a friendly alternative, with the motto “Play nice”, with the idea of following all laws, not taking up more than one lane, and avoiding escalations with drivers. It left from the south side of the Pfluger Bridge on the second Friday of every month. I think the original start was around 4:30pm in winter monts so we'd still have some sunlight, but we added a rendezvous point so others who worked until 5pm could join later. The ride died out circa late 2022. In the mid-90s we tried a similar idea, but it too died from lack of interest. There were always so many people who said, "I don't ride in Critical Mass because it's too confrontational and/or law-breaking. I'd ride if there were a 'clean' ride." But both times we started such rides, these people were nowhere to be found. Friday Midnight Rides These left from Ozone Cycles (also defunct) at 32nd and Guadalupe. I think they were the late 90s / early 2000s early. Old events Cyclecide Bike Rodeo (2003) Cyclecide was a punk-inflected, DIY event that featured riding tricks, riding contests like obstacle courses, and a quasi-demolition derby in a loud, irreverent atmosphere, along with the house band Cookie Mongoloid, featuring a Cookie Monster–costumed singer. When I heard there were coming to town I made a web page for them since they didn't have one. And then of course I attended. Bikes Across Borders Benefet (7/12/03) See the writeup in the Austin Chronicle. Bike-In Theatre Cars had drive-in movies, now it was the bicycles’ turn. Waterloo Cycles (also now defunct) used to show movies on a projector on Friday nights outside the shop. I can’t remember what years it was active, but at least from 2002-04. I made a page to list some of the 2002 schedule. Austin Bike Summit (2/10/2001) Brought together lots of bike activists from different quarters to strategize and plan for what road projects to push for. Here’s the writeup in our newsletter. Austin Bicycle Parade (1998) [Message sent Sept. 26, 1998 by Chris Symank] Autumn Bike Parade a success! With roughly a hundred people doing the full parade, showing an awesome sense of solidarity and festive spirits, the parade went on with few hitches. There were many people in costume and decorated bikes as well as people looking awesome without any decorations. No kinetic bike sculptures yet, although altered bike frames and a trike decorated as a swan were there. There are already plans in the heads of a few of the riders to build some floats, and one just didn't get finished in time. People waved, smiled and seemed very impressed. Traffic was managed by the parade participants including our own Officer Smog complete with Texas ranger cowboy hat. Also present was the Goddess of Fall. A scarecrow, about 7-8 rollerbladers, a unicyclist, a cow pedaling a recumbent cargo trike with dog running beside it, lots of recumbents including the grand swan three wheeled recumbent, lots of smiling kids and the Yellow Bike front loading trike. The ride was said to be too short by most participants, and designed to be mostly flat and easy with no major uphill. Of course we will work to make a longer ride for next time and we will seek out donations for an post-ride picnic party. A t.v. news team taped the start of the ride and at least four people (including me) videotaped the entire ride to make a cable access show.