Should I ride on Wednesday?
 

Nor'easter expected, beginning early morning, by afternoon for coastal Maine there may be sleet and freezing rain mixed in, windy, blizzard conditions, accumulation 6-12".

I have the option of working from home. I'd like to try for the challenge, but the freezing rain gives me pause. And visibility problems.

If I ride, it would be the 3-speed internal hub, but no studded tires. (This would be one of a handful of days I could justify having them.)

[Edit: It's 5 miles each way, small suburban roads, some shoulders, some not, no bike lanes, usually moderate traffic.]

Normally I'm all for riding in the dumbest of weather. But ice, snow, wind and freezing rain is dumber than I like to ride in. Actually I have no sense when it comes to these things. Fortunately, my wife does. And if we got a storm like the one you're describing, I'd get a ride to work. So unless you can pick up a pair of studded tires tonight, stay home and be warm.

There's a challenge, and there's tempting fate. Studded tires may keep you upright, but it offers no protection against motor vehicles sliding helplessly into you. When freezing rain hits here, cars pile up like crippled skaters in an ice rink.

that's it in a nutshell. I'm taking the subway.

I would say no if it does get to 6" deep or more. But it depends, have you ridden in deep snow before? Do you remember where all the objects are under the snow? How about lots of ice? With 5 miles of hard ice, without studs don't bother to try.

You really can't ride much in 12" of snow. Around 12" or so your bottom bracket (pedal axle) is touching the snow. Then to go far you need to walk and drag the bike. If it's five miles of 12" deep snow it would probably be better to walk. That's in nice fluffy powder and about 25 degrees. If it is wet like they say it will be, the snow will be twice as hard to get through. Around 5" your pedals hit the snow 6" is time to consider walking if the snow is heavy, assuming you are in good shape and can ride hard all the way. If not it may be less.

You can ride, walk, ride, walk, a few miles if needed, but you may be very late to work.

Studded tires are only a benefit on ice or hard packed snow, in soft snow they are the same as knobbies. It does say rain and freezing, that could ice up your bike so much it has 1" diameter spokes. And the brakes of course won't work. If it does get slippery it's easy to fall in the road.

If it gets plowed you may be fine, but the mound from the plow takes away a place to move to the right if you need to. You may be in the lane all the way.

My suggestion is not to ride to work, but to find a safe place to ride in a few inches of snow to see how it is. Try 5" and about 8" if you can. 3 or 4 inches is fun if you are in good shape. Just try riding across the yard. Run your tires as low as you can possibly go and not pinch flat. The side of the tire may say the minimum pressure. If there are icing conditions ride in the yard to see what it's like. Try as many different things you can think of away from the road now. IOf the snow gets wet and heavy from rain, try it in the yard. Same for a frozen crust, try it.


This will give you better judgement about when to ride to work for the next storm, if you have not tried deep snow or ice already.

Get on the bike first thing in the morning, ride a mile away from your home, say to yourself "yeah I could do it" then go home get a hot cup of joe and work from home. Take another ride at lunch, say the same things and at dinner time watch the news and be thankful you don't have to ride through that slop!
Steve

i had to make the same kind of decision today. it had snowed most of yesterday and continued through the night. part of the problem is knowing the exact conditions of the road most of the commute is on. the night before i decided the conditions were too quesitonable to go ahead and ride, then this morning i changed my mind which you guys probably understand. after i got to the main road, i decided that i just didn't have the control i needed around traffic. the wheels were to squirrly in the snow even with studs. had the plow come through and gotten most the loose stuff off, i woulda been ok.

i was too uncomfortable around any kind of traffic when there was more than a small possibility i could take a dive.

John, you would be better off walking without a bike, than walking (pushing) the bike to work. Stay home for Valentine's Day...

As I mentioned in another thread, I'm probably -- and I'm getting a lot of pressure from the wife -- to not ride in tomorrow. The amount of snow doesn't seem too bad, but the snow, changing to freezing rain, changing back to snow sounds bad. Sounds like the whole city is going to be a skating rink in the afternoon. Unless things sound very different tomorrow morning, I'm takin' the T.

Oh, and I have a bike with studded tires, fenders, full disc brakes. I can live with breaking it out on Thursday.

I rode today, but tomorrow I'll probably just work from home and maybe take a ride on the backroads here in the afternoon (after shovelling out). Like I always say, riding to work isn't a pecker size contest, if it don't feel safe, don't worry about what others might think. The pittance all of us would donate to your family probably wouldn't even cover a decent funeral bouquet. ;)

I voted to not be stupid.

Do as I say, not as I do. :D

Since when is the weatherman ever right? I brought my crap home w/ me so I can work from home tomorrow if the building's closed. If it's not, I'm gonna ride in.

True, but it can go both ways. I was here for the Great Ice Storm of '98, and I don't recall hearing him predict that it was going to rain ice for 3 days and knock out power for a week! :eek: (I wasn't a cyclist then. However, on the plus side, we lived in the country at the time and had two wood stoves that served us well. It was sort of fun getting up and chopping wood every morning, for the first few days...)

If there is freezing rain expected - get the studded tires. Snow, etc, sure you can get away with underinflated slicks or knobbies but with flat sheets of ice - accept no substitutes!

another vote for take a leisurely ride about 10am as a break from working from home.

I'll probably ride because the buses and trains get all screwed up in the snow. Otherwise, I'll ski half way and then catch a bus.

Matt

Couldn't say it better. I'm with chipcom on this one.

I vote for don't be stupid. We don't get a lot of freezing rain here but I did wuss out last week when we had freezing fog. I'm really not interested in falling over

It's worth sitting out just the storm. Remember, if it's gonna snow that much, you'll be able to ice-bike after the storm for a few days.

Man you guys got socked! WOW! Guess that stupid Ground Hog really flubbed this one up!

I'm staying home. The freezing rain and low visibility were the deciding factors. It just didn't feel right. Thanks for the validation.

In a weird way, this proves that I'm not insane the rest of the time, because it demonstrates that I am capable of making rational decisions after all! :D

I still believe in Phil...this was just ole man Winter showing that he still can make us miserable before that early spring!

I think the jury is still out on that, John. :p

Our neighbor headed off today to BU Dental School. I mentioned that the city tires on the MTB (it's my bike he's riding) are slippery in snow, but he wanted the adventure. It doesn't look like we're going to get more snow although I don't think freezing rain is better.

I rode in thru it today(Wednesday), good times all around, although I did pass 1 other biker, and I couldnt help but think that "man that guy must be nuts to be out riding in this kind of weather." Which is the same response I got from the 1/2 of my office that didn't call in. No studs, although I could see how they would have helped.