Festival Area For Bikes & Brews Moves To St. Barnabas Parking Lot

CHICAGO, IL – One of the Beverly/Morgan Park area's premier summer events will move to a different part of the neighborhood. A new course will be used for the Beverly Hills Cycling Classic in 2018 and with that will come a new festival area for the "Bikes & Brews" event that has accompanied the bike race in recent years.

For several years, the festival area was centered around the Beacon School property at the corner of 107th Street and Longwood Drive, but since that property isn't currently owned by anyone organizers could not plan to have it there this year according to Beverly Area Planning Association Executive Director Susan Flood.

So that means an all new area, and an all new course, for the event this year. The festival will take shape in the parking lot of St. Barnabas School at 101st Street and Longwood Drive with the new 1.54 kilometer criterium course taking riders on a loop from Longwood to Seeley Avenue and between 100th and 102nd streets.

"I'm excited about the new location and the neighbors are excited too," Flood said, noting that the course was one of three BAPA had certified before the first Beverly Hills Cycling Classic was held in 2003.

"The festival keeps on growing and this change should bring even more spectators," she said.

Planned for Friday, July 20 this year, the festival will open at 4 p.m. and feature craft beers from Lagunitas and other favorite breweries including the local ones, Open Outcry Brewing and Horse Thief Hollow.

The beer will be complemented with plenty of food and live music after the races, of which multiple are planned for the day between 4 p.m. and 10 p.m. A kids' zone will make the event family friendly, with organizers only asking for a $5 donation to BAPA in exchange for entering the festival area.

Flood says the number of food trucks and breweries will increase significantly from a year ago, partly as a result of the location change. A full list of vendors planning to be at the fest should be available in early July.

For the cyclists in the races, the course will still have the hills and and thrills that attract pro/am riders from around the globe.

Also remaining is the race's status as the first of the year in the Prairie States Cycling Series Intelligentsia Cup. It's also the only major yearly bike race to be held in the city of Chicago.

The thrill of feeling the breeze of the cyclists as they zoom by will also return.

Watch this here during our live coverage of the event last year.

"It's incredible," Flood said. "To see them fly by like that is rare."

For sponsorship opportunities, call BAPA at 773-233-3100.

RELATED ON PATCH: Top Speeds Reached During 2017 Beverly Hills Cycling Classic

Photo: Cyclists zoom by during the 2017 Beverly Hills Cycling Classic / File photo by Tim Moran