Somewhere around 1980 or '81 a few guys in Paducah who liked to work out, loosely formed a bicycling group called The Trace Racers. The one function of The Trace Racers was weekly training rides from the Nautilus Club. 
 
In June of 1987 members of that group approached Martha Emmons and Hutch Smith, co-owners of a recently opened new bicycle store in Paducah, with the idea of using the new store to form an organized bicycle club. 
 
The concept put forth was a BikeWorld sponsored club which would elect officers annually, establish a racing team, promote an annual race, publish a newsletter, hold additional group rides, and provide a place to serve as club headquarters where riders could meet; where mail and phone calls could be received and ride notices posted.  In return the store would be good public relations benefits and word of mouth advertising. 

Some of the people involved in this effort were: Frank Fletcher, Frank Duperrieu, Ron Pasquini, Dickie Coleman, Joe Shane, Darrel Gordon, Alan Hook, Mike Long maybe John Weyers, Mike Beyer and Cecilia Beyer, now Harper. (This may be leaving some folks out, or adding someone who didn't come along till a bit later, but, these are all people who were involved somewhere close to the beginning.) 
 
Throughout that summer Ron Pasquini, who worked at BikeWorld, and Martha, talked to BikeWorld customers and promoted the idea of an organized bike club. The charter meeting was held at the Nautilus Club in October of 1987. About 30 people attended and The Chain Reaction Cycling Club was formed. 
 
At the end of the first year the group was already in danger of falling apart.  There were only 3 newsletters (one page each) published during the first 12 months. The only organized rides had been the weekly rides from the Nautilus Club. Nearly every new rider who tried the ride was dropped during the first mile by the more experienced riders. Most novices didn't show up a second time. In spite of the original good intentions, there had been no casual or family paced rides, and an organized ride schedule was yet to be established. 

At the annual meeting that fall, a cold cut buffet, held at Ky Oaks Theatre, Martha was elected newsletter editor, (a position she filled for the next 4 years), and BikeWorld did in actuality become the club headquarters. The store purchased a new typewriter and copy machine for the use of the club and assumed the responsibility of maintaining and subsidizing the club. For the next four years the newsletter was typed, printed, folded, stamped and mailed by Martha or the BikeWorld staff. 

During this time Chain Reaction utilized BikeWorld's space and staff to provide storage space of the club records, phone service, including long distance calls, maintenance of club records and recruitment of new club members. In 1988 club president, Frank Fletcher, and Martin Mundy talked to some of the club's more 
competitive riders about organizing a racing team. BikeWorld agreed to purchase and provide team uniforms at no charge to the team members. This uniform consisted of black shorts and a red jersey. The jersey had a band of white around the chest with the BikeWorld logo printed in green on the white band. However, since there were no requirements for making the team, aside from declaring yourself a CRCC racer, the racers remained individuals, without a coach or group goals, and never coalesced into a team in the true sense of the word.

If they went to races, they trained and traveled independently of any CRCC affiliation other than their uniform. Of the 20 riders who obtained a free uniform less than half competed in a single race during the subsequent racing season. There was an effort made to collect the uniforms in the fall, so they could be redistributed to those club members actually active in racing, but more than half the uniforms were kept by the riders, and the attempt failed. 
 
A discount program entitling racers to receive 10% off on bikes and 20% of parts and accessories had also been agreed upon with BikeWorld. Once again, as there was no criteria to define a racer, club members who had never raced a single race bought bikes and frames for themselves, their wives, children and girlfriends.  BikeWorld was not satisfied with the race team promotion and pulled out at the end of the year. 
 
Also in 1988 Frank Fletcher successfully promoted Chain Reaction's first United States Cycling Federation race. It was the fore runner of The Paducah Summer Festival Stage Race, which is now held in July.  The 1988 race was called The West Kentucky Dogwood Classic and was a road race held in April at Land Between The Lakes. It drew over 100 riders, including the 7-Eleven juniors' team, and was an organizational and financial success. As a result, around $1000 was put in the club account.  
 
The annual meeting was once again a buffet of cold cuts at Ky Oaks Theatre. In 1989, under the direction of club president, JT Toy, the club added a League of American Wheelmen, (now League of American Bicyclists) sanctioned century to the club activities. A contest was held to name the new ride. Martin Mundy submitted the winning entry The Misaligned Minds 100.  Also, in 1989 The West KY Dogwood Classic Race was expanded to include a prologue in Melber, KY on Friday night. Frank Fletcher continued as the race promoter while Martha Emmons handled most of the day to day organizational responsibilities as a part of her duties at BikeWorld.  
 
The year end annual meeting was a cold cut buffet held at the Lions Club Building on Lone Oak Rd. By 1990 the race was the three event stage race it is today. But, due to Frank Fletcher's other interests and responsibilities, there was no one to serve as race promoter and it seemed the race might have to fall by the wayside. Rather than have that happen, Martha agreed to serve as the race promoter and organizer.  
 
Although the club president, JT Toy, helped as much as possible, for the next two years she raised the money for the race, recruited the volunteers and promoted the race nearly singlehandedly. This included running off al promotional brochures and entry forms, mailing all the entries, fronting the club money for advertising, mailing, deposits, permits, supplies, etc. This year the race was moved, at the request of Paducah Summer Festival Committee, to it's July date. A criterium was added and the name changed to "The Paducah Summer Festival Stage Race. 
 
It was sometime around this time that an attempt was made to put together a booklet of a local ride routes. Well intentioned, it turned into a huge job with vice-president of touring, Rich Harrington, doing the bulk of the work of compiling, printing and distributing the pamphlet. Tempers were short about the amount of time the project entailed, and there were hard feelings on several sides about the delays.  Eventually, they were printed, but at a cost of some upheaval within the active members and officers of the club. 
 
In 1990 the year end annual meeting was again a cold cut buffet held at the Lions Club Building on Lone Oak Rd. In the winter of 1990-91 another attempt was made to organize a sponsored racing team.  BikeWorld was again approached and again agreed to buy team uniforms but with the stipulation that although the store would subsidize the difference between the cost of the uniforms and the price paid by club members, they would, in fact, be sold to riders. No one would receive a totally free uniform. Whaler's Catch Restaurant contributed $500.00 to the club, and in return, the jerseys featured a Whaler's Catch logo across the front. The jerseys were hot pink and blue. The shorts were black with BikeWorld printed down each side of the legs. No one at BikeWorld was consulted about the design of the uniforms, and until they arrived in the store were not aware the jerseys would carry the restaurant's advertising. The store management felt that BikeWorld had contributed much more than $500 over the years and that if any business name appeared on the jersey, it should have been BikeWorld's. The store was never able to sell all the uniforms and ended up writing off more of a uniform donation than had been planned.

In the summer of 1991 club members held letter writing parties, and had "pizza and politics evenings" writing over 300 letters as a part of a successful campaign lobbying for a KY Bikeways Commission to be established and a KY State Bike Commissioner appointed in the state. State 
Representative Bobby Leeper from Paducah assisted in this effort in Frankfort and worked with Rep. Paul Richardson to sponsor the legislation. This was eventually enacted and established the Kentucky Bicycles and Bikeways Commission.   
 
The annual meeting was held at Lone Oak Methodist Church on in the middle of a pouring thunderstorm. We had the lowest attendance (about 35) of any year to that date. State Senator Bobby Leeper spoke to the group about the pending legislation affecting KY bicyclists. He said legislators had been surprised by the number of letters from Chain Reaction members, and that CRCC was becoming noticed across the state. Lee Blackburn was elected president of the club. He made it a point to learn as much as possible about staging the race, organized the Misaligned Minds much earlier than it ever had been done before, and gave club officers specific assignments and duties. 
 
February of 1992 was the first year for Chain Reaction, participate in the League of American Wheelmen Leadership Seminar in Louisville. Partially as a result of ideas taken from this workshop the club's leaders set up an awards program to recognize club members for various achievements.  BikeWorld also agreed to set up a sponsorship program for CRCC riders who obtained USCF racing licenses. This entailed BikeWorld paying for the cost of any club member's racing license, and the rider receiving back from BikeWorld a percentage of any money spent at the store on race or training related bicycle items. 
 
Lee Blackburn served his second year as club president. Our race and the Misalinged Minds ride continued to grow. Sara Church volunteered to take over some of the duties connected with organizing the race. However, by the time the race was finished Lee and Martha questioned whether they could justify the time they were putting into it. Although the race had been originally planned so that any money left over after expenses would subsidize the racing team, the fact was, there had never been an accountable, organized "team'" Racers had, not, since 1989, done the bulk of the work with the race.  In reality, each year the proceeds left over after the race went back into the operating budget of the club and allowed the club to offer free meals at the annual meetings, generous snacks on rides, and reimbursement to club members who spent their money for club good.  
 
The annual meeting was held at the Irvin Cobb Hotel and annual awards were presented for the first time. Ronnie Wilson was named CRCC member of The Year. No one in the club would agree to accept the nomination for club president for the upcoming 1993 year. The nominating committee approached Hutch Smith, co-owner of BikeWorld, to serve. Up until this time, the BikeWorld owners had been adamant about not serving in any CRCC governing position. Neither Hutch nor Martha, at their insistence, had ever had any control of the club's finances or the authority to write checks on the club's account. The club membership list had never been used for BikeWorld ads or direct mail campaigns. (These self-imposed restrictions have continued through the present time.)  Hutch expressed concern that his involvement might appear to cross the line of store sponsorship into a conflict of interest. However, after it became apparent that the club would be without a president in 1993 he agreed to accept the position. 
Mike Reed took over as newsletter editor. Sara Church took over the job of race promoter and under her leadership the race drew more riders, offered better prizes, raised more money and attracted more spectators than at any time since its inception. 
 
CRCC member Sue Morehead was appointed by the governor to the Kentucky Bicycle And BikeWays Commission. Her involvement in state level meetings provided CRCC with more input and state level recognition than at any time in the past.  Today, we have the third largest and most active club in Kentucky, we are one of the contact clubs for the Illinois State Bicycle Commission and our race is the largest, most well organized stage.