Originally Posted by
Hypno Toad
I ride through the Minneapolis winters, most cold rides are commutes (10-12 miles one-way).
Yesterday was about 20-25F and I did about 30 miles running errands on my summer commuter with winter tires (studded front), this slowed me down a lot. I typically ride this bike in the summer at 16-18 mph, yesterday was 12 mph average speed. The muscles just aren't happy at these temps.
I will go out for fun rides on cold days too, last year I did 24 miles in sub-zero weather. I have the gear for cold weather and I enjoy these rides.
I also ride through the Minneapolis winters (well, a western suburb of Minneapolis winter, anyway). I go along with the idea that "There's no such thing as bad weather, only bad clothes." I went for a shortish 7 mile ride last night and it was the equivalent of a 15 mile summer ride. The main reason for this is switching from a road bike with 700c x 25 tires to a fat bike with 4 inch tires and several layers of clothing and Lake winter boots. Even my "fast" winter bike (700c x 32 studs front and rear) is pretty slow compared to standard road bike. Those Lake boots are probably a huge factor in speed as that's rotating weight but without them it's not worth riding! I was actually a little over-dressed last night and got pretty warm. I'm looking forward to the next few days as the temperature plummets to near-zero as it will give me a chance to fine tune the latest clothing I've picked up at various temperatures. And, yeah, it's hard, but think how much stronger you're going to be on May 1st!