RidingMatthew

It was 60F when I left the house this morning! Where did these fall temps come from!? I was not quite sure what to wear this morning.

This week is 5 fer 5 week. I have commuted everyday this week! Last night's ride home was brutal, I was terribly slow. I was so slow I texted my wife to let her know I was okay but just riding really slow.

I am excited with that considering I wrecked last Friday. My legs/ skin is starting to recover. I am excited also because I have 598 miles (or 962km) for the month which is my all time high for a month and I have 3 days left.

No riding home today though date night with my love She is picking me and bike up downtown and then it is dinner and movie!

tarwheel 

Another beautiful day and coolest morning in quite a while. I get rewarded for my efforts with a cold shower when I get to work because they are still performing "annual maintenance" on the boilers, which leaves us without hot water for about a month every year.

Schools are back in full force and traffic really picked up this week. I had got in the habit of leaving later in the mornings over the summer while schools were out, but it looks like I'll need to start leaving home by 6:30 am or earlier to avoid the worst of the school traffic. My route goes right by a large high school and I prefer not to be riding past it when a bunch of teenagers and bus drivers are on the roads.

bmthom.gis

One of the best mornings in awhile here! Did the bimodal thing where I carpool in with the wife and have a substantially shorter commute. Hit the KOM on Strava for the only segment on the route I took...not that it matters all that much but it was fun to hit that on a Friday. Registered for a century in October, so it is time to quite screwin' around and up my miles..amongst other things I need to do to prepare (overhaul the bottom bracket on the bike I am going to use...)

mgw4jc

Nice miles Matthew! Some of those skin abrasions seem to never go away. I have a couple of spots from who knows how long ago.

I'm sure your showers are quick! I think the humidity is supposed to be back next week. I guess we should enjoy the cool days while we get them.

tarwheel 

It's been a strange summer in NC. We had one of the hottest Junes on record, but July and August have been much cooler or close to normal. We've also had periods of daily thunderstorms with intermittent dry spells. My lawn is not liking it and about half the grass died. Probably should reseed this weekend.

Squeeze

Awesome weather today. The TV said it was 60 degrees when I left earlier than usual to get a nice long Friday morning ride before work.

Usually I carry a yogurt and a hard-boiled egg (and some other stuff - wallet, keys, etc.) in a "soft" handlebar bag on my road bike. It's a bag that straps to the handlebars and hangs pretty loosely, unlike the nicer, larger ones I've seen pictures of that firmly attach to the bar with metal or plastic clamps.

Today, however, I used a different bag to carry my stuff and firmly strapped it it to the recently installed front rack on my rigid mountain bike and rode gravel most of the way to work, including one long, fast, bumpy downhill shortcut that I always avoid on my road bike.

When I got to work today, the hard-boiled egg had pretty much peeled itself and the yogurt had exploded. Eww.

Lesson learned: breakfast needs suspension, even if the suspension is the merely the gentle swaying of a handlebar bag.

HardyWeinberg

Rode my steel bike w/ fenders after a month of CF roadbike. What a tank! Sigh... going to be a long fall/winter w/ el nino too.

DogBoy

What's awesome is when you ride East in the morning into a 20 mph headwind in the rain, but during the day, one front clears and another moves in so the ride home looks like I get to head home West into a 20 mph headwind with rain.

groovestew

Well, I didn't plan to ride today. I was slow getting out of bed, and planned to work from home, so no need for a commute. Often, I'll go for a 18km ride before working from home, but I was too lazy today.

Then two things happened. First, my laptop computer lost its hard drive, and since I'm a programmer, having a working computer is pretty important. Second, I found out that some computer gear I ordered was being delivered to the office today. So, I hopped on my bike, brought my computer to a shop for repairs, then went downtown to receive my shipment. It's a nice day for a bike ride, maybe a bit on the warm side for my liking.

RidingMatthew

thanks @mgw4jc I am a bit surprised. I just want to be able to sleep on my right side without pain and be able to fold my knee a full extension with out pain.

txcrash

This week was a 5 for 5'er for me too. Good weather, good rides. Plenty of miles.

E.S.

Ride to work was nice partly cloudy skies, barely made it to town in time to avoid a downpour. Ride home started fine with a nice tailwind, and I could see that I was was headed toward a very dark cluster of clouds. Ended up getting dumped on from about half way all the way to home. But it actually felt nice since we haven't had any good rain in so long, I didn't even bother to put my jacket on. The rain was so heavy that for a few miles I could barely see out of my fogged up and soaked glasses. In the last 3 miles the skies began to flash lightning and in the last mile, the thunder was amazing. Still managed to average 19.7mph over 13.6mi. Got a great lesson in what it feels like to have one's braking power go to crap in the rain. But it was awesome.

Commuted 162.3 miles from Tuesday to today.

essiemyra

The ride in this morning was very nice, a bit humid for my liking. The car behind me coming down the hill tried to pass me on the left as I was reaching the bottom of the hill were I turn left. I motioned for him to stay back and then I hand signaled to take a left. I was a little annoyed by his actions.

mgw4jc

It sounds like you did the right thing. I get this occasionally when approaching a stop sign. The car and I will reach a stop sign at the same time, but the driver doesn't realize that if he starts a pass, he'll be in the middle of the road once we reach the stop sign. Quite odd.

Humidity and dew point are back up a bit this morning. But not bad.

I had a guy back out of a driveway just in front of me this morning. He was in a small Honda Fit type car and there is a row of bushes lining the driveway, so I'm sure he didn't see me coming. I was on a downhill and had to brake pretty hard to avoid rear-ending him. Luckily his reverse lights caught my eye just in time.

arsprod 

Back to work after short vacation. Fortunately, the commute was beautiful - 67F, clear skies, little wind, ahhhh... almost makes coming back to work worth it. Almost

Wolfhaven

Warmed back up for a low 60's commute in. Plenty of fog. Rode in short sleeves again which is nice. Leaving before sunrise and it's working out. Very little traffic at the earlier time too. Nothing too exciting along the way. A few deer with fawns was about it. The sun was a brilliant red when it came up over the lake. Beautiful site. Today on my ride home I'll hit the 1,000 mile mark which is right on my goal before Sep 1st. Next goal is 500 more before Nov 1st. If the weather cooperates it should be an easy one to reach.

KCBikeCommuter

I had a car pass way too close this morning. It's a fairly good size road (4-lanes plus a center turn lane, but no shoulder), but not much traffic at 6am. I caught a red light and a car was behind me. The light turned green and I proceeded straight across the intersection. On the other side of the intersection there is some really rough pavement, and I usually move a bit further to the right to avoid it. Not all the way to the white line, but more toward the right side of the lane. Well, I guess the guy behind decided that was enough room for him to pass. It wasn't. Even though I moved to my right, I was still taking enough lane that there was no way to fit my bike and his car in the same lane. I'm not sure when he finally realized this (probably just before he was about to him me), so he had to veer to the left partially into the next lane. His side mirror still came pretty close to hitting me. Unfortunately for this guy, the lane he veered into was was already occupied by a large 4x4 truck that was none too pleased about nearly getting side-swiped. He jumped on the horn to let him know about it... and just like that the jerk became someone else's problem. ha ha...

dramiscram

Nice weather, no wind.

txcrash

Fresh legs this morning after a weekend off made for some speedy times. Traffic was reasonable, seems I've started to properly "train" the drivers at a poor intersection of a mup and road near the train station - no close calls in a while... I'm not sure how much is that I'm there every morning, the many lights I'm rocki (including helmet) or if there are other factors - but I'll take it!

spivonious

Uneventful rides since my last post with the exception of last Friday.

I'm heading home from work, make a turn onto a road where visibility isn't great until a certain point. I hear an SUV behind me so when we get to that certain point, I make a move to the right to signal it's okay to pass me. SUV stays back. I look back over my shoulder, and SUV is still at a safe distance, so I figure the driver is just a little timid. We get to another point where it's safe to pass, and I look back again. SUV still not moving up. "Oh well," I think. "Just someone being extra careful."

So I reach a hill on this road. I hear the SUV speeding up to pass, so I stay to the right (road is plenty wide at this point). SUV slowly drives past me, and now I realize why they were hanging back. Teenagers hang out the window while Eye of the Tiger blasts on the stereo. I flash the horns, and a cheer goes up within the SUV.

I guess the kids are alright.

bmthom.gis

Perfect ride in today! It was drizzy/misty and rained a lot last night, so the fenders got to do their thing. Did a nice 40 miler on Saturday, so felt good to spin and work out the soreness that was still hanging around.

HardyWeinberg

Nice. Windy. A lot of the shoulders had already been swept from this weekend's epic windstorm. Did a 21 mile route rather than the 7 mile straight(-ish) shot. Need 15 this afternoon to get to 400 for the month despite a 10 day break.

Phil_gretz

It was a warm but uneventful ride in this morning. I took the fixed gear again, which is becoming my "go to" bike when I don't have clothing to haul. The backpack is a little warm and sweaty, but not too bad. Now, with the sun coming up later each day, I've switched to handlebar and head-mounted forward lights.

I was the only rider to park in the work bike racks today...

RidingMatthew

your last sentence made me smile. haha Said so calmly and matter of factly.... haha


Better start getting some miles in if you are doing a century..

It was pretty humid this morning as in it was raining but I still prepared like I was going to ride and by the time I pushed off it had quit, but still humid.


I am going to ride a decent ride home today. my Mrs. said I could go longer today. It will give me my all time high for miles for the month. Technically already have it but want to pad the number a little. It will also be the first month I have ridden everyday! Even after wrecking (2 weeks ago) I rode.

bmthom.gis

Exactly! I want to feel good during it instead of over it at 60 miles in. Enjoy your longer ride home!