Took it really easy this morning; on yesterday's ride home I tweeked my left knee a little. Not sure what I did but, I think I pushed a little too hard, in too big a gear while starting from an intersection. I gently rode on it until I hit the 14th Street bridge then, I had to stop, stretch it a little bit and continued on. It hurt the rest of the way home but, after some Advil, felt better by this morning. It's still a little tender but, not too bad. I'll do the Crystal Ride on Sunday and will let my knee determine how many laps I do. I'll continue taking Advil today/tomorrow in the hopes that the pain goes away entirely, we'll see. Also, my new route takes me right past the DC water front. I told another cyclist yesterday that that is either the best smelling part of my ride or the worst. I think it'll get much worse as summer progresses and I continue to ride past all the dumpers full of seafood. I love seafood but, months of this (overwhelming) stench could turn me off to it. That would be a shame. Should be a nice ride home this afternoon.

Last ride in of the work week! Rode everyday for the first time this week and my legs are ready for a day off. Planning my Sunday ride for the newspaper, going to try a for 25 miles. Have a nice weekend all!

Barring any unforeseen circumstances that would prevent me from riding home, I'll be 5 for 5 this week commuting by bike, which is a first this year. It was finally a nice sunny dry day, so I rode my road bike. Boy do I love that thing...it's so fast compared to my other commuter. Smelled bacon on the way in, and later on a bakery. Mmmmmm.

I think today makes the first week since last year that I've gotten my lazy butt on the bike for 2 days in the same week. Today's ride in was nice, temps around 60 and a quick ride. It's only supposed to be around 70 going home, so it should be a decent ride (a bit more humid).

Super windy.

Too short, but then again, most of my commutes are too short at 7 miles each way. I swang down to the Lincoln Memorial end of the Mall on the way in before doubling back. Added an extra 1.5 miles to my ride, but I still wanted more. Might have to try to slip outta the office early to have time to make my ride home a little longer.

One funny thing on the way in... I started hearing this weird noise intermittenly from theback of my bike. I finally pulled over to check it out after a couple minutes... the shoulder strap on my Topeak EXP rack trunk had come unclipped on the back end of the bag and must have been bouncing/dragging on the asphalt on the MUP from time to time. I'm just glad it didn't get caught in my spokes, or that amusing little sound story would have been less entertaining for me!

Figured I've lurked on this forum long enough. Commute in today was awesome. Temps were in the low 70's with only a little wind. I won't be commuting home since there's an Italian festival downtown today and there's no way I want to try to ride home after downing a few canoles and glass of Peroni

My commute yesterday on the other hand was both good and bad. The weather was good, bike was sound, but I got "cupped" by some redneck in a SUV. I knew something was up when I saw him slow down, but I didn't see the paper cup of what I think was Sprite until it was almost on me. At least it was cold .

I hear you on that. Something about smelling bacon in the morning wakes me up. I pass by a brewery as well in the morning, probably the only smell I can think of that's as good as bacon. Smells a lot like a bakery.

Hot almost didn't make it home. Started out to fast my fault going to take it easier starting out from now on. Not sure if I'll ride tomorrow or not only have one work day left though.

A beautiful clear cool day here in NYC. 10 miles in, 10 miles back. Traffic wasn't too bad.

Today I did some food shopping before I went home and carried it back with me, then I stopped for a bottle of wine near my house.

I feel comfortable now doing this, but still can't manage more than once or twice a week due to all the other stuff going on. My kids played Carnegie Hall on Tuesday, and we had to shuttle them on Monday for dress rehearsal. It's pretty cool to have 2 of your kids playing Carnegie Hall at the same time. My guess is my 3rd kid will get her chance too.

And our take on the old joke, "How do you get to Carnegie Hall?", "The Q train, because I never hear them practice".

Today my ride to work was fairly pleasant, it has been sunny all day. It was about 20Celsius coming to work, not too windy. Something got in my eye though, and I think I destroyed the innards of my new gear hub (price tag 235$).
I was changing gears for a hill, going down to direct drive 1.0 ratio.. and as it was doing yesterday on my test drive, it started skipping. Every few moments tension would go Completely slack, no output from the hub at all.. So now I have 1,2,3,5 gears all doing that. I think I destroyed some of the cogs inside. I hope it has a warranty, I had overlooked a part of the instructions because of thinking the actual hardware was missing certain color coded indicators.. Which it was, but the part related to gear adjustments had it's own indicators which I had never seen.

Just yesterday I had got it all setup.. I fought with putting a new chain on, taking out links, busting an inner tube trying to put the tire on.. etc etc

Other than potentially needing to pay out of pocket for a replacement hub or repairs, it was a good ride.. the high gears(3.25) were excellant and were a nice change from my old hub(approx. 1.6).

Didn't commute today but did get a new set of wheels after breaking two spokes on Wednesday. See how the CR18 rims hold up on the deore hubs and hope the spokes are better quality.

I've missed posting in here over the last few days and had some memorable commutes. Last night the ride home was splendid. Just a touch of a light rain and the late hour meant that I had the bike path completely to myself. So wonderful to have that ribbon of asphalt that winds between the river and the road like it was made just for me.

Tonight another fantastic ride home. Spotted the blinking tail light of another cyclist about 1/10th of a mile ahead as I entered the bike path. I picked up the pace to catch up to them. We chatted a bit after I caught him and then I kept going with the hard pace. He held on a while but then dropped back. It was a nice incentive to pick up the pace a bit and get a bit of a workout. Added to a little 25 mile fun road ride today was a nice 45 mile day.

The combination of a little more free time and the better weather means more miles on the bike- yay!

A bit chilly this morning nothing a hoodie couldnt handle, so glad i ride to work we are having the ironman 70.3 this weekend in boise and most of the streets downtown ar closed haha take that motorists. Supposed to be a nice day though i think highs in the low 70s, not sure whats going on with the weather its usually in the 90s by now.

This morning Saturday of course no traffic a bit humid but not bad. Took my time and took a little detour that bypassed one hill still made the same time as the day before. Tonight a bit warm not as bad as last night. Hit a not-so-Smart Car parade and a train.. simply wonderful. It was a nice break but I'm starting to learn momentum is everything.

Traffic is crowded as usual, but it doesn't matter to me, I shuttled in between. I rode very slowly today just to enjoy myself.

There is a nice eloquence to the above post ^^^^.

Rain today. Rode in for a 2 o'clock matinee performance. Rode home for a little dinner and rest then back on the bike and back downtown. Once I got to Boylston Street I was weaving between the post-Fenway Park crowd and the Gay Pride parade crowd- interesting mix. The 2 show days make for a nice 40 mile day.

I'm officially a bike commuter! After getting my bike on Friday and going for a couple rides, getting used to my gear, and comfortable on the road with traffic I actually rode to work today (I had Friday and Saturday off this week, work on Sunday.) Packed up last night a ton in my backpack (a big one, like a day hike pack.) Had to bring dress shoes, polo, dockers, underwear, a towel, hair/body wash (best invention ever), belt, all the stuff usually in my pockets, and flip flops for the shower (being in college you learn the best way to not got foot fungus is to assume everyone else has it). Left early just in case, took my time, got to work, showered, changed, and ditched the extra stuff in my locker. After work I rode back home, downhill, with much less stuff in my backpack. Overall I enjoyed the experience, speed limit of 25 in-town means 1/2 the journey I can keep up with traffic from light to light, another 1/4 on roadside bike path keeps me safe, and the other 1/4 has wide shoulders, so I never feel afraid I'm going to be hit. Plus I start work at 10:30, so traffic has died by the time I go in, and I leave a 6:30, also quiet. Picked up a pita on the way home. I love biking so far. Will start posting in here with interesting commutes and updates.

If only the dew-points were below 70. I felt like I was riding through soup.

I bike commuted every day last week, for only the third time in 2010. The weather has been very hot and humid in NC, but at least the morning commute has been nice. So far I've managed to dodge thunderstorms, but I know my day is coming so I reinstalled the SKS RaceBlade fenders on my bike. On Sunday, we had a thunderstorm so severe that I would have had to seek shelter if I had been riding. There were 60 mph winds, lots of lightning and torrential rain. I was in a grocery store when the storm hit and the lights went out. I had to wait 30 minutes for the rain to die down enough to flee to my car and it was still raining pretty hard then. Sure glad I was driving and not on my bike.

Bit muggy, and the Dr will have a fit if he knows I'm riding, but I'm back at it. Today was a 5 deer morning... had to dodge 5 of the bastids. I'm a bit gun shy now considering what I've been through.

A little sluggish this morning with rubbery legs, a result of yesterday's Crystal Ride. I was content to just spin along and take it easy until a tandem followed by another cylcist zipped past. I accelerated and dropped in behind to take advantage of a nice pull. The single rider and I both passed the tandem as we turned left and climbed the cloverleaf to the 14th st bridge. I stayed tucked behind the other guy as he was moving at a really good pace. I split off just before Maine Ave and took it fairly easy the rest of the way in. The bike is riding/handling so much better after replacing my touring tires with my Conti Ultra Sports-I'll probably leave them on for the rest of the week then, the bike goes to the shop for a rr. hub re-build while we go on vacation. I suffered 3 or 4 flats in a two week period at the beginning of Spring, I hope good luck holds for the rest of the week.

[rolls eyes @ overcautious doctors...]

Friday's ride home included targeting and passing a kitted road rider, 10 miles into my ride, laden with my super xl mess bag and rolling 2.1's and a rack on my folder. It was fun to surprise him.

A mile later he passed me with a big smile and left me in the dust by catching a light. Not that he needed the light to drop me!

It's exams time and the year is winding down, so for today's ride in skipped my usual morning multi-modal train ride. It's 5 miles with the train, 16 by bike.

*And I beat (or at least tied) the train!* Today was my first ride in clipless pedals-- I gave them a try sometime after 11 last night. As if my neighbors don't already think I'm weird enough.

It was also my first ride to work on my new hand-built and evil-looking black anodized wheel from the LBS. Nice to go from dry rotted whatnot to schwalbe blizzard 23's

My forty dollar Panasonic feels like a million bucks!

Did not ride this morning. I ended up sleeping in since we have this in the house:





He's lost/stray. He's just a puppy though. We put up signs in the neighborhood but I think he's a dropoff- with some of the home foreclosures, people just leave pets behind. The plan is to turn him over to a dog rescue organization but he's putting on the charm pretty strong right now so maybe he'll stay.

He does cry a lot at night though; it's like having a baby in the house again. I'm running on about 3 hours of sleep today.

cool looking dog, DH-- I like the brindle to his coat.

It was gorgeous! Fog had settled all over the trail, so everything came out of it as a silhouette. A little bit of rain partway through. Also, someone sprayed

HAPPY
BIKE 2
WORK
WEEK!

. . .

FREE
COFFEE
THRS

on the trail. It was cute. I'm looking forward to that free coffee!

This was my first wet commute. Now I know why they call them suicide brakes. So, I rode more in the down position than usual. I think I need to adjust my saddle, but that otherwise worked out pretty well.