Third ride with the computer. I bumped my average up to 24kmph. Though I think I'm just doing less coasting slowly to a stop at stop signs/lights and accelerating faster...

Nice cool morning, low humidity. It was beautiful. Though my knee is starting to ache. I might do a MTB ride to work some day; the biggest issue is that the rear rack is on the road bike and I hate backpacks.

The ride this morning was beautiful. Temperature was about 73°F, light wind, clear skies. This is my second official commute and I've already shaved about three minutes off my last ride (Friday). No major problems. Now I just have this strange urge to do push-ups.

Confirming what other NC commuters have said, today was a b-e-a-u-tiful day to ride--almost chilly!

My computer rolled over the 1,000 mile mark this morning. My average speed for the first 1k miles of the year was 16.2 mph.

Coincidentally, yesterday was my 40th birthday (and would have been Sheldon Brown's 64th I just learned). Although I know many of the commuters here are older than I and ride longer commutes, I'm pretty proud of the fact that at age 40 I'm a 5-day-a-week commuter riding 10 miles roundtrip.

A great morning for the commute today. Temps in the 60s, humidity relatively low and not too much traffic out. I finally got my road bike back after getting the rear hub replaced but haven't had a chance to ride it yet. Maybe tonight I will get it ready for tomorrow and give it a workout.

Commute home yesterday scared the hell out of me. On a 35mph road where ppl speeding sometimes do 50, I had a car go by me at probably 70mph. He passed me with 1-2 feet from my bar end and I was riding in the lane on the right tire track. It absolutely scared the p%ss out of me. I caught him at the next light and started yelling at him. What was worse, was he said he never even saw me...and based on his slightly apologetic reaction I believed him.

I'm running two superflashes and a cateye LD1000 that are on in the day and an ansi vest. I think I'm switching back to my less direct, but safer route through a parallel neighborhood.

I saw a big coyote on the trail yesterday morning. Shortly after seeing the coyote I saw a ped with two dogs off leash. I guess the coyote smelled them and came to investigate. I got a mini lecture from a guy who thought I was trying to "jump" him rather than agree to work together. Oh well. The ride home was overcast so it cooled off from our high of 95.

This morning's ride was nice. With yesterday's incident, I decided to stay behind a guy today. It seems that annoyed him as well. Passing him would only lead to him tailing me and we have a repeat of yesterday. I can't win.

I played hard all weekend and ate poorly. Yesterday, short on sleep, I opted to ride to work with no wind in anticipation of a 17mph tailwind on the way home.

Halfway through my 15 mile one way ride home I pass a house along the country road. The owners were sitting out in their front yard, they called and waved to me; startling me out of my stupor. I was shocked at how zoned out I was. 2-3 miles later I found myself in the middle of the lane! I wobbled the remaining ¼ mile to my turn off… I had a Salted Nut Roll in my bag so I stopped and ate that and tried to press on. A few hundred feet later I stopped and called my wife for a ride!

I’m blaming it on the strenuous activities, the poor refueling and the lack of sleep… but I also have made an appointment for a physical!

Rode the Gazelle today. I love my carbon bike, but there's something about Reynolds 531 that can't be duplicated.

I do use Bluff/ West , I am at Countyline and Railroad Rd and then I take the bus up to 71st and Georgetown. I hope to be able to make it all the way up there without having to use the bus.

Today was my first commute to my new job. 18.5 miles from south Philadelphia, Pennsylvania to the northeast section of the city. I found some good light-traffic roads and made the trip in an hour. The new office has a locker room with shower, indoor bike racks and a fully equipped bike repair shop. Well, it is a bike company, so I guess the perks are understandable. I consider this living the dream!

My question is about Bluff/West street. Do you feel safe riding it? The bike lanes come and go and the traffic seems very heavy. How Far is 71st?

My commute/training ride was good. I was having a blast with most of the ride, but had two close encounters. The first close encounter included two minvans, a curb and me. I was on the shoulder and had taken the lane to go past a curb that abruptly intrudes the shoulder. A lady in the left turn lane for opposing traffic was patiently waiting her turn when a grey minivan being driven by a woman on her cell phone passed me on my left with very little space between me and her van!

The second close call was the near blow out at about mile 17. i don't know what I hit, but I heard a loud pop and immediately got off to check the tires. Sure enough, I found a 1.5'ish inch long gash in my tire that stopped at the threads. The gash ran front to back on the tire. To the right of the gash, an office staple was still in the tire, which I promptly plucked out. The tire was holding pressure, so I decided to proceed on with the ride, dealing with a flat later on if it occurs. Well, the tube held air for about 13 or so miles before I noticed that it was getting low, which is about when I arrived at work! Pretty dang close. To make matters worse, I didn't realize how vulnerable I was to getting stranded, but I suddenly recalled what happened to me last year. After getting my CO2 inflater, I did a training run by treating a good tire and tube as a blow out (I let the air out). I took the tube completely out like I would for a tube change/patch, and then reinstalled it and inflated. My CO2 couldn't get me even close to 90 PSI (27 x 1 1/4"). I also didn't have anything to boot with, so I would have been stranded this morning.

I'm so glad I made it to work! The weather was also very beautiful.

flyingcadet

3rd flat in 2 wks this am, after the last 2 I decided my tire had had it, ordered a replacement, and actually had it on hand when I found the flat in the garage this am. So, new tire (old one had 4300 miles on it, not what I was hoping for but I these roads really are pretty crappy so what can you do), although I was a little bit later than I wanted to be for an early meeting (not much time to cool down before the meeting was to start). Then it turned out the meeting was in this hyper-secure area where I had to get checked into a waiting room w/ no ventilation and wait until the meeting time. Found a bathroom to change to regular clothes then went back to resume sweating in the waiting room, decided to hang out outside the building instead and that helped a lot.

Finally got out on the new Xootr Swift, 12.5 miles down to my day job. It was a little warm, but I started my new "get better on hills" plan, which is basically just trying to stay a gear up from where I'd usually be.

Parental logistics mean I'll leave the bike at work and ride it home tomorrow evening, so it's not my full round trip--but it's something.

Nice ride home, a little warm, but still nice.

Rainy 74 degrees! Added an extra 20miles to my route it felt so good

Bluff is not very busy when I leave in the morning around 5:00am cars give me plenty of space, during the ride home is is alot busier but I have always beeen given quite a bit of room. BTW, 71st street from my house is about 23 miles one way.

thanks for the info. last year I thought i was going to die trying to ride 14 miles, now I am not going to say it is nothing, but it is no porblem. Bet you are doing 23 before you know it. I will probably try Bluff tommorw but it will be about 6 am. Lots of traffic then. I can always cross back over to madison if it gets too hairy.

In my commute there is a dip where I try to get a max speed that will hold for for the day. Today when I came up to it there was a deer crossing the road. So I had to wait. After watching I attacked and came up with a record. 30.2 mph

Great ride today. Temps and humidity lower than normal for mid-July in Virginia. Loving the new Surly LHT (after replacing the stock saddle).

The ride to work today was fast and the furious!

I tend to avoid commuting to nightshifts as my energy levels are a mess when it's time to return home in the mornings, but as I've not ridden the past three dayshifts and feeling mad at myself I went on a sort of self torture ride to furiously pedal my anger away. I was soaked in sweat by the time I reached work.

It's just what I needed, I feel so much calmer now.

All this brought on by a bloke. Ahh, I think I should waste more energy on my bike. It never lets me down. *knocks on wood*

This afternoon was great! I had a follow up chiropractor appt at 5:30, so I got the boss' ok to skip out a bit early. I started off with adding the 'optional' mile loop at the beginning of my ride, and then my normal route for 90%. Instead of going home, I rode down through town center and over to the chiro. His office has a grass yard and picnic table, so I was able to cool down and relax. Changed shirt and had appt which went great-don't need to go for another month!-Rode home from there. Overall mileage was 15.5, up from the normal 10. My dr. is a big road bike guy, and runs/sponsors rides and such, so he wanted to come and see my bike. He actually thought my MTB conversion was nice (he is a 100% road guy-no MTB, no anything else) and gave some suggestions for helping my back out when riding.

I have only been doing 10 mile rides so far, so this was the longest ride so far this year for me (just got back into this a bit back). Felt good after, if a bit tired. I might incorporate the town center loop into a couple commutes every week!

I drove today ...I did find out that the hill I ride up usually is a 9% grade though...

Nice, cool ride in. No sun in my eyes. I could get used to this morning thing.

The ride home was a little different, I was trying to avoid traffic, it was hot, I was tired, and I didn't want to climb. I took a different way home, about 9 miles. I warmed up on the MUP, knocked all the climbing out at once, wound through some spiffy quiet little neighboorhood streets, and stopped at Vitamin Cottage on the way home. Not bad!

The ride home was one of those fast, frenzied, stress-burning rides. I was making up for lost time (and harshed mellow!) because I got off late. I was in a closed-door meeting with my boss and his boss. I pounded as hard as I could so I could put as much distance between myself and work as possible.