Good ride to work & home . Also had a ok day at work .
Have a good nite .

my first commute was today. 10.22 miles total. not bad. little rainy but what can you do.

It's raining today. I ridden everyday so I'm driving to give my body a rest.

27F, clear skies, and no wind… clean and crisp. I realized a couple new hurdles in regards to winter riding… You can’t spit or blow snot rockets with a balaclava! And it takes an extra 5 minutes to unlayer when I get to work.

about 40 °F, stiff wind straight from the north, makes for a quick trip in. forecast is for snow flurries this afternoon; bring 'em on! i would appreciate a little less headwind, however, god, if you're listening.

Finally I found the cause of my recent spate of punctures - the edges of a small cut in the tyre were rubbing the tube. I put a patch inside the tire to protect it for the time being, until I can swap it for a new one. Maybe it will keep going for a good while yet?

Nice sunny but chilly ride today - we are definitely getting towards frosty mornings, a time of year that I love when the weather is cold and sunny and abhor when it is mild and damp.

Still on the hunt for a new bike frame, but I may go for the Kinesis Racelight option I saw a few days ago.

Cheers,

Ed

Back on the bike after driving one day. Felt good this morning. 40+ F and cloudy with strong headwind, although it felt good when it was a tail. Looking sunny out there even with flurries in the forecast.

My weekend riding buddies are getting worried -- I have had only one day off the bike (except for Sundays) in the last month. They are trash talking me like crazy. After ten years of getting my legs torn off, this year I returned the favor several times. It's only going to get worse for them as I am promising to make their wives "widows" or at least their wives will lose them to a painkiller addiction!

Congratulations!

I had a very peaceful ride home through a snow shower last night. I'd put the knobby cross tires on the bike the night before which I think came in handy on a few of the wooden bridges I crossed on one of the bike trails I rode on. Didn't see another soul on a bike (usually I'll see at least one or two).

For various reasons I didn't ride in to the office today, but those reasons seem to have disappeared and I now wish I had. The sleep in was good, though... :D

Today I set a PR on the way to work!
50 minutes from filling my water bottle in my kitchen to pulling up to the bike cage at work - 10 miles, some hills, lots of lights. Cold enough to see my breath, and the sun was in my eyes in downtown. A beautiful morning all around.
Can't wait to see how it goes on my way home today (not much longer now).

Today was 61 and overcast... very nice riding weather with a slight breeze. I stopped and got some food on the way to work, too. My commute is normally only just over 2 miles so I try to throw in some intermediate destinations to make it worthwhile. Going home in the morning should be lots of fun. I get off @ 8am and it's probably going to be in the 30's. :(

Summer is over...Here in California..The problem..Early morning is like mid/high 50's which is pretty chilly on descents to people who live with the sun...Upon leaving work at 6:30 am, it is weather where you need jackets/gloves and arm warmers, but before home you strip to basic shorts and jersey..Keeps your jersey's pockets full.Couple weeks ago it was just jersey's and shorts.
Soon will need a brighter light for commute in a sunset.

Cold, cold, cold. Today, I learned: 1) I need new gloves to go over my glove liners. I've been getting by with glove liners and my normal cycling gloves (no fingers), but it's getting to the point where I want some wind-block on my fingers. 2) The proximity of my mouth and nose to my eyes, and thus my eyeglasses, is a problem. I've tried two different kinds of goggles and neither seem particularly useful. One set totally ruins my peripheral vision - I'd have to be Linda Blair to see behind me. The other set fogs up horribly no matter what I put on them. I'm going to try the Visorgog thing I've seen people talking about; hopefully that will do the trick. I really don't want to get contact lenses just so I can ride my bike. 3) Chicago in the winter is ... really quite windy.

Cold and windy as it was, though... I'm finding that the worse the conditions, the better I feel when I'm done. Not necessarily physically, though I always feel pretty good after a ride no matter how rough it is. But emotionally, I feel really good. I get to work in the morning after a ride through rain, or cold, or wind, or all three, and I've already done something harder than most of my coworkers will do all week. And then in the evening, I go out and do it again.

I'm really starting to feel like I'm riding against my own weaknesses -- the part of me that wants to stay in where it's warm, to be comfortable, to not risk anything, to always be in control, to stay well within the guidelines where everything is easy because nothing requires any effort. Every time I get on my bike I'm telling that part of me to go to hell, and it feels really good -- better, the colder and wetter and tireder I get.

Ahhh, bike-zen. :)

Ahhh, harsh. :)

But no, I'm glad somebody had a great ride that day. I skipped it because my legs were feeling a bit noodly and I thought they needed a day to recoup, but my brain was in serious veto mode all day. From now on, I'm not skipping a day unless I'm falling over.

Were you out today? I nearly froze my cheeks off. :) I'm doing pretty well with the layering, but I'm definitely in need of face-gear. At least it wasn't raining!

Chilly nor-easter shoved me along the lakefront this morning as I laughed at the brown waves crashing and sloshing over the edges of Chicago's concrete bathtub. But there will be hell to pay on the head-winded northbound commute tonight...good thing I have bar-ends to make me more aerodynamic.

No, wait, they were stolen off my bike while I was working today.

Bar ends? You've got to be ****ing kidding me. What are they...$10 a pop? Hey, next time just ask me for the money because I'd rather have the dirty, old, scratched-up bar ends, thanks.

But then later I am knifing through cold dark air and my LED is painting a blue oval on the lakefront path. I am deep in my pedaling rhythm and all thoughts have nearly ceased...when I am passed by an older gentleman on his recumbent who--for no good reason--nods and says "Good evening." This is the zen of bike commuting. It is a way of life for me.

Do you hear me world? YOU CAN'T TAKE CYCLING FROM ME. IT IS THE WAY OF MY LIFE.

P.S. Any thoughts on theft-resistent bar ends?

had to work late tonight for some maintence, so I thought I wouldn't have time to take the long way home. Well, I finished my preperations early and had about 30mins to kill.....so I take the bike and do some laps around the site. I tell myself I'll do at least 2, I did 4. 11 miles. an extra plus is that it was dark, so I got to test out my new headlight....sweet.

After all the work was over, a coworker saw my bike and asked if I wanted a ride home. I said "Yes, actually I do want TO ride home." :D I think people are starting to understand that I ride because I want to, not because I have to.

I wish everyone I work with, the people that do not understand the pleasures of what we do, could read that. Most of the time, we do it, not because it's easy, but because it's hard.

Had a good ride in & home .Nice and cool on the way home.
Had to be in low 30 tonite . But still a good ride .
Have a goog nite .

Ride home was good - got progressively colder and foggier towards my house. Temp somewhere around 30. Started getting charley horses in my calves and toes when I stopped. I guess I need to start adding another layer...
The hills are starting to get easier, I'm thinking about changing my route to include more flats where I really push myself in my head and not so much beat my way up the hill and then fly down the other side, trying to keep from freezing.

I felt strong on my ride home yesterday! :) It was a crisp, clean, and clear 35F with no wind… I hammered across the rolling hills standing on some climbs… It was my best ride in a month… :D Al for a meager 16.1mph! :eek: Man those Nokians and winter gear slow you down! I need to get up 10 minutes earlier :( as I have been running a little late ever since I put them on.

This morning my legs were tired from last nights ride. It was a head down churn all the way in.

Ahhhhhh, that "cold" felt wonderful. The ride home was great, wasn't it? No wind at all. I felt overdressed both in the morning and in the evening.

A pedestrian stopped in the crosswalk (not last night, but the other day) to let me pass through, saying "I don't want to stop your momentum..that's important!". Pretty cool that he thought of that. I appreciated it and let him know.

Great! I came across a fellow commuter who knows another bike commuter I had come across in the past; they work together but he said our mutual friend got knocked down by a car a couple weeks past. I shared that I was dinged last year by a motorist who turned in to me and claimed she didn't see me "because my yellow jacket blended in with the fall colors on the trees", doh, I didn't know fall foliage was florescent yellow! Anyway, I guess that is what fellow comuters do when we meet, share our most recent war stories. Bill H.

Heavy driving rain and a chilly temperature made for an interesting bike ride this morning. Wore my Gortex Ski shell along with my new illuminite booties which protected my feet from the rain adequately. I counted four other brave souls willing to challenge the elements - it was kind of funny as I entered the bike trail I take near my apartment I instinctively went to check both ways carefully thinking to myself, "Ha, no one will be crazy enough to be riding today" but sure enough there was another cyclist passing at that exact moment. We stayed sort of close on the ride and having some company made the trip a a little easier. I was very happy with the performance of my new Armadillo Hemisphere tires in the rain. It made me glad I didnt go with real slicks. All in all a glorious day for a bike ride!

First truly cold morning of the season this morning. It was 29 deg F (-2 C) when I left home. Warmed to about 32 (0) by the time I got to work. Everything was pretty toasty, but it's getting close to time to change over to the warmer gloves - was just wearing the fleece gloves today. The cool weather seemed to slow me down a little bit, but it was still fantastic to be on the bike.

I'm really enjoying my new route to work. There's one intersection under police control while some roadworks are done, and every morning the cop there has been great. He always waves me through as soon as there's a decent gap rather than making me wait with all the cages, which gives me a good headstart up the hill through the roadworks. Works out great for me!

The fog machine has started. We had a steady soaking rain for two days. The ground gets saturated, the sun comes out, pulls the moisture out, the sun goes down, the moisture condenses and hangs near the ground. This cycle can go on for weeks. I can hardly wait.

Lucky for me that I've invested in a good light, lots of blinkies, and a set of fenders. I think I need to swing by the LBS for shoe covers too.

46 F / 8 C and rainy. I had to pick up my daughter from school today after work, so I towed the trailer. I brought it inside at both origin and destination so she did not have to be outside at all.

Paul