By CARL E. HARTDEGEN
Special Correspondent
WESTFIELD – Women who love to ride motorcycles now have an opportunity in Massachusetts for support, training and camaraderie after a city woman established a chapter of Stilettos on Steel.
Lori McElhiney of Westfield said in a recent interview that she learned of the national organization of women motorcycle riders when a friend who snowbirds in Florida sent her a newspaper clipping about a Stilettos on Steel chapter there.
McElhiney said that when she looked into the organization she found there to be hundreds of members across the country.
According to the group’s national website, the organization began as a single group in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, but grew under the direction of the national president, Anne Zube, into an a national confederation with a mission – “To unite female motorcyclists of all skill levels for friendship, support, and peer-to-peer or professional learning opportunities that will make them knowledgeable and safe motorcycle operators.”
Lori McElhiney of Westfield, the Massachusetts coordinator for Stilettos on Steel, rides her Harley with other members of the women’s motorcycle riding group during a recent run through Westfield. (Photo © 2016 Carl E. Hartdegen)
Chapters spread to Michigan, Minnesota, Indiana, Florida, Connecticut and Colorado. This year Massachusetts was added to the list when McElhiney started a chapter in the Bay State.
She said when she contacted the headquarters of the organization she learned that a woman in Connecticut was starting up a chapter. She said she was able to help that woman, who “had only been riding a couple of years”, organize that chapter.
But after three years, she said, “The Connecticut chapter was very big and they were doing very well … so I asked corporate. I said ‘Hey, I’d like to start a chapter in Massachusetts’ and they said ‘Go for it’. So 2016 is my first Massachusetts chapter season.”
McElhiney emphasized that the Stilettos are a motorcycle riding group – definitely not a motorcycle club.
“There’s a huge difference” she said and explained “With a riding club, the club comes first … and then family and work. With a riding group your family and your work come first.”
She said that her new chapter has 15 members, so far, but said that there are also about 60 “enthusiasts” who ride with the group when they can.
McElhiney said that the members and enthusiasts keep in touch via a private Facebook page and get together to ride whenever possible.
With her close ties to the Connecticut group, she said, the two groups often ride together. Last Saturday, she said, members of the two groups made a “run” to Hogback Mountain together.
McElhiney said that the Stilettos are a huge resource for women who ride motorcycles.
“It’s all about supporting new female riders (and) experienced ones” she said noting that when she started to ride motorcycles there were not very many women riding them.
“When I bought my bike for my 20th birthday there were no women riders … I rode alone. I rode alone for like 28 years.”
Members of Stilettos on Steel, a women’s motorcycle riding group, cruise up Southampton Road on a recent run to Hogback Mountain in Vermont. (Photo © 2016 Carl E. Hartdegen)
“Now there’s a lot” she said and said that new women riding motorcycles can learn a lot from the experienced riders they ride with. She said that when women ride together they can have opportunities to learn from each other that they wouldn’t have when riding with “the boys”.
“We’re not allowed to ride with the boys, if we ride with the boys it’s not a Stilettos run” Mchiliney said.
She said that the group has a strict “no drama” policy and said “we ride together – it’s safer together and we just kinda support each other. We always have some kind of newbie running around that we can kinda help and teach.”
McElhiney said “We have a good time hanging out together and it’s an opportunity for women to ride together.” She said that, before the Stilettos, women tended to ride with men because they often had no other options. “Usually, with a lot a women, when they ride they’re riding with guys – and that’s not an option (with us). Boys aren’t allowed to ride with us. They have cooties.” she said, with a dead pan delivery which lasted only seconds before she started laughing.
But, McElhiney is serious when she says “It’s (about) support for new riders and it’s an opportunity for women to ride with other women.”
She said that women motorcyclists who want to contact the Stilettos can find most of the chapters on Facebook or, she said, “they can go to the Stilettos on Steel website (www.stilettosonsteel.com) and that provides an email address for every regional coordinator, including me, and then that email will be forwarded to me.”
