Well I was going to make yesterday my first commute of the year, but once again woke up to heavy winds and rain so I drove. Which was a good thing because it was raining to beat all he&& when I got off work. I don't mind riding in the rain but 10 miles in that down pour would of been a bit much. Fortunately we are between storms so I got to ride in today first time in 1.5 weeks. And boy do I notice a difference I feel physically and mentally. Hope the rain and wind holds off until after I get home tonight. We had 6 inches of rain in December thats even heavy for us. But it might help to relieve the drought we are in (we are expecting another dry spring) ChrisL wish I could send you guys some of this :)

No rain to speak of and the wind has dropped, making today's commute a fairly staightforward thing. Straightforward until I nearly got taken off the bike by a bonehead driver as he accelerates hard onto a roundabout directly in front of me :mad:.

commute home today was absolutly awesome the ride in was a bit nippy but it warmed nicely and on my lunch hour i rode almost 40 minutes just fooling around pushing hard m. I'm a little sore tonight, but i had forgotten how good a good endorphine rush felt. it warmed to around 50 f by noon.

Took the day off from riding today. We had a nice snow storm which started last night and did not end until afternoon today. We gained another 14" on top of our existing 20". There was also a lot of drifting. It took me 3 hours to clean up my driveway and decks.

Looking forward to getting back on the bike Monday

An auspicious start to today's adventure - A half inch of fresh snow over an icy patch on the road in front of my house resulted in a slow speed but very sudden asphalt kissing face plant when I tried to turn left to go down the street. I guess that's why they call those tires "slicks". An intelligent person would have returned the bike to it's rightful place in the garage, but not me, I kept pedalling!
Freshly salted main roads made for a briney ride in. My feet got wet and cold, but I persevered and took less than an hour for the 22km ride. Temp of -4 C, 24 F, light snow, no wind.
This week's planned purchases: booties & gaiters!

I've been at home with a really nasty cold since New Years Eve, so this was my first commute for the year. That cold is still very much with me, so I considered driving in. However, there is also a forecast of snow for evening rush hour -- not a good idea to take a car, given that traffic is immobilized under those conditions. So, off I went, making the first tracks of the year on an unplowed portion of my route. Very easy conditions, and just beautiful. We have about 3" (7 cm) of snow now.

Result -- I feel the best i have in a week. Good cold medicin!

Paul

Today bit, I broke my rear shifter. It's a crappy 5 speed SRAM grip shifter. The plastic outside loop broke away from the metal inside leaving me stuck in high gear. It was tough peddling through the snow in top gear.

Ugh, when is winter over? I want to retire my winter beater for the summer and get on my Rocky Mountain!

I have been riding my pos mtn bike back and forth. I had intended to use it all winter, but it appears that we are not going to get much if any snow this year, so I am looking for a replacement upgrade whatever. I have looked at the lbs, they carry trek, and giant mostly a few gary fisher mtn bikes. I am indecided what to get and the fools are no help at all when I can get them to talk to me they want to show me bikes way out of my price range.:mad: anone have a suggestion I am trying to decide between a comfort/mtn bike and a cross/road bike. my commute is short bout 5 miles. it is all on pavement some of the streets are old brick paved streets that is as rough as it gets. there is one curb at wiork i hop once in awhile. so I am thinking a road bike would hold up fine.

Paul H
I just moved back to New England from Tyson's Corner and the 2 years I was down that way, it hardly snowed at all.
We are sure having our share up here this year.
Today was a cloudy day with about 2" additional snow. The ride home was very cold ( I heard the news at 6 and it was 22 with a good stiff NE wind).
The forecast for Tuesday is freezing rain. I guess that will be a drive day.

Nemo, if you have a chunk of brick paved streets, I would go with a cross bike rather than a full on road bick. I think you would find the comfort bikes a little heavy. They are meant for 5 miles on the week-end, not every day. A mountain bike with slicks would be another option. For a 5 mile commute a 3-speed could be a good choice.

Got a southerly headwind and tore it apart this morning. Should fly home if it stays. Being a southerly it's keeping things a pleasant few degrees cooler (unlike that town in Western Queensland that hit 49 degrees C yesterday :eek: )

All was well this morning. It was a balmy -5C with no wind. The new $5 shifter I installed last night worked like a charm. The only downside is that the warm weather we have been having has left half of the streets I bike on snow free and thus my studs are wearing rapidly.

The city I live in still has not kept up with plowing the shoulders of the route I ride on. This forces me to ride on the edge of the car lane, which is unnverving given the speed of traffic. I plan on calling and complaing later today.

As for snow...it has never really stopped since our storm last Saturday. We have been getting a mere 1-2" per day and it looks like this will continue through the week.

yesterday was my first time on the bike in 15 days! b/c i was on a non-cycling vacation in Russia. for me, that's a long time not to be on the bike!

and on my return from cold snowy Russia i was greeted by snow here in Munich - yeah! although not as much as in Russia.

my first commute of 2003 today was great with about -6C and mabye 2cm snow on the ground. going home will be about 5cm snow as it's been slightly snowing most of the day. very nice for riding although a few of my coworkers were dumbfounded... "you road TODAY?"

with the studs on front and back i didn't notice even the slightest problem even on the ice patches where snow had been cleared and refrozen (OK, it was nice not to be wet since it rained so much in warm November and December)... although they salt the roads here pretty heavily which sucks as many of the larger roads are wet salty slush.

Back on the saddle again after taking december off. Way too long, and now I am feeling the pain. But the ride was good. Spring-like weather. Absolutely gorgeous outside.

Felt good to be back on the bike.

Thick, thick fog this morning. Even with all my blinkies and reflector bands I don't think cars were seeing me. If it's that foggy again tomorrow, I'm going to have to take a more car-free route to work.

first commute this year :D

Nice weather, clear sky,cold (-6) and NO wind!

I did some running after my ride and i could see the sun go down, something i missed for about 3 months...

My type of weather...:beer:

Another inch of the white snow today and forecast for 1-2 for the tomorrow am.
Today was fairly cold and windy.
Not much in the way of excitement.

This morning was what makes winter riding fun. My studded tires were silenced by the light layer of snow on the road so I didn't disturb the turkeys crossing the road, 2 flew right in front of me, which was a little disconcerting as these were big hens.

This evening was more of what makes winter riding hard. Lots of salt and slush, but at least I worked late so there weren't too many cars.

That evil and disgusting northerly wind was back this morning, with it's horrible habit of increasing temperatures and humidity. I swear, it even felt like the sun itself had extra intensity today. Here's hoping for some big spanky tropical downpours to come along and save us all.

Yet another beautiful golden sunset this evening. This working overtime isn't so bad after all!

Hi Folks,

First day back after returning from California. After enjoying temperatures of 25°C, sub zero bicycle commuting is something of a change :eek:
Also. I need to get into shape after eating all that christmas pudding :p

Happy new year to all,

Ed

It's been way too icy to commute up here. Maybe next week if the weather gets milder.

Lovely, the first time I've ever had to ride in snow (2 whole inches).

Nice snowfall this morning, and I remembered to bring my camera, but it froze in my pannier and wouldn't work. Next snow I'll remember to put it in my pocket. Lot's of deer and turkey tracks in the snow crossing the road. Lots of mom's in SUVs taking the kids to the bus stop. The traffic was so backed up from the school that it was actually easy for me to make the left turn into the practice parking lot.

Made my second commute of the year today. This afternoon it was unbelievably warm for St. Louis in January, hitting close to 70F. Back to sub-freezing by the weekend.

On both trips I've cleared that 6" curb that foiled me last week. I'd never make it in MTB racing :D

Big spanky headwind this morning, and it's still blowing. It's also overcast which is good. There were some promising black clouds hanging around Springbrook earlier, but alas they haven't arrived as yet. :(

Cold and beautiful this morning!

Also a chilly northeastern headwind

Cheers all,

Ed

A nice ride in this morning, +4 C (38 f), 15-20 mph headwind for half the trip made me work a little harder than usual, but dry roads made for a nice change.

Had heavy fog this morning. Made the usually boring city scenery mysterious and exciting to bike through. My glasses would fog up about every 30 seconds or so which got annoying after a bit. It was really weird to have this kind of fog in the desert. Got to work with a good layer of dew all over my micro-fleece jersey, gave it a rather interesting sheen. For some reason traffic was really light. Hope I have enough battery left in my front light to get home tonight after that ride in!