Set my PR for hottest commute yesterday. I saturated with water beforehand and felt fresh. Was fine at first then after 20 miles or so I felt inexplicably crappy. Then I realized, now might be the appropriate time to have a sports drink on hand. I've always shunned them because of the ridiculous amount of sugar, and the fact that you are usually more likely to see a NASCAR fan or chubby kid in an arcade drinking one than a serious athlete. But OK, 36 miles in 105+F heat index, I could see maybe having a little something extra. So long as I still have good ole H2O to dump on my head.

Brilliant!

First commute on the new trekking bars....feels like a whole new bike!

Dark and cloudy today. Plus, everybody got back from vacation today and all decided to drive in. Oy!

First commute to the new location. Its been over 10 months and the old commute was 7 miles. I rode with my daughter to her first day of school. She's not old enough to be embarrassed of her old man. I continued to work for a 16 mile ride.

Mine was pure awesomeness. 26 miles, the first 10 into the wind and then 16 with a sweet tailwind. Lots of birds: egrets, blue herons, red tailed hawks, blackbirds, sparrows.

Nice.

I have been having some awesome (though rather hot) commutes lately that I forgot to celebrate 2 years of commuting. Aug 1 was the start of my third year commuting. And what a way to kick it off......heat advisories! Just to post a quick figure, in 2 yrs, I have biked 8000 miles! This year will be my best yet with almost 3000 miles to date!

I have learned quite a lot and have been most thankful to the newbie sticky thread in here!

Enjoy and ride safe!

txbiker

My record for the number of moose in one trip is 9. Also both black and brown bear are occasionally on the trail. What a place!

It's a great place to live and cycle. Denali will be out all week and the riding is great. If you want a cool bike trip, check out the Fireweed 400 website!

Got up early to commute in. Thunder, Lightning, Wind, and heavy rain.
No commute today!

By quiting time it was sunny and hot. Sigh!

Hello Forum

I have been away for a while because of computer problems but I'm Back.

I am still commuting to work everyday and man it is hot.

Some of the rides I make and very cool though.

Take a look at my You Tube channel to see all my latest videos of my rides.

Here is a link to one of them. Hope you enjoy it.

My latest ride to the store.

We had a thunderstorm very early this morning. It cleared up by the time I was out of the shower, so I figured I would put my new fenders to the test, and really wanted the ride anyway. I got in to the office right on time, and found out that the whole transit system was a disaster; the subways were barely moving at all. I never would have made it in if I hadn't taken my bike. When everyone else finally got there, between one and three hours late, boy did I gloat.

The ride in was nice this morning...still raining though. I really need to get a rain jacket. A fender wouldn't be a bad idea either.

Anyways, I leave around 0500 every morning, so the traffic is usually pretty sparse. Seems more people had places to go this morning, there were a bunch of cars out. The weather is calling for tomorrow to be cloudy but no rain...we'll see.

Yesterday's ride home was brutal, the temp hovered near 100 but the humidity was, fortunately, not bad. I was fairly well hydrated and left my helmet and gloves at work, anything I could do to keep cool. I did a couple of laps around the parking deck to loosen up a little then climbed the ramp, right into the oven. My face puckered like a prune, eyes squinting, they stayed that way for half the ride. I took it easy, saw only one other cyclist whom I drafted for a while, and really started dragging near the end. Once I got home I drank my Endurox while taking a cold shower, I was pretty wasted for a good hour or so after.

This morning's ride was a little cooler but more humid. I had to use 3 wet wipes to clean off instead of the usual one. Feel pretty good now and am optimistic that today will be somewhat cooler.

great commute first one on the new kona

Nice ride today. Mid 50Fs, low humidity, and a very light tailwind. I was determined to avoid the impromptu bike racing that has plagued me over the last 3 days. I promised I'd stay at or below 15MPH the whole ride in, and just be relaxed. About a mile after I left, I caught an older woman on a hybrid going almost exactly 15MPH, so I stayed behind her. She was pretty fit. Seemed to be commuting too. One roadie passed us. I had to fight the urge to chase.

And something exploded! The power cables alongside the MUP were slapping and then I heard a really loud BRRRRRRRRRRRRRAP! The cables were swaying for a good half mile after that. Maybe a tree fell on them in the woods. It seemed to scare the woman I was following.

I decided not to bike to work today after riding in the intense heat yesterday. It was 102 when I left work on Wednesday, a record high for the date, and it is expected to be hotter today. The heat was brutal and it felt like I was riding in a furnace room. I drank a bunch of water all afternoon and filled up both of my bottles before I left work, but the water was hot by the time I was halfway home. My biggest concern was getting a flat tire and having to fix it on the roadside because I am sure the temperatures were much hotter on the pavement. And guess what? I noticed my rear tire feeling squishy about the 7-mile point and sure enough I had a slow leak. Rode very slowly the rest of the way after I felt my rear tire rolling on a corner and I made it home with about 20 lbs pressure in the tire.

Anyway I "wimped out" today and decided to drive. Part of my rationale, in addition to the brutal heat, was the air quality. It was Code Orange yesterday and today, and my throat felt scratchy and sore last night and this morning. Part of my reason for riding is my health, but I figured I wasn't doing my health any good riding in weather this hot with bad air.

My commute is so short that I don't normally carry a water bottle, but after the ride home yesterday I was pretty thirsty (we broke a record for our area, 105 degrees yesterday), so I brought a water bottle today and even used it once, ha ha.

Humid and hot and my eleven year old doesn't listen very well.

Yesterday on the way home was plenty hot. Thankfully it was a pretty quick, eneventful trip.

Best time in to work today, somehow timed so I had green lights almost all the way in. I do have once section of lights that I have the timing down, so I just have to figure out the rest of the commute. Otherwise, much cooler today.

Wonderful trip in. The head wind training of the past week paid off today with a light cross breeze. Maybe the trip home tonight will see a few extra miles.

Pass this thought to anyone disgruntly in your office:

Excersize increases endorphines. Endorphines make peiople happy. Happy people do not go around killing other people. -Elle Woods, Legally Blonde

Great ride.

I've now had two rides using my new handlebars. Both ride times have been on par with my fastest ride times previously. I thought they'd be slower if anything, but apparently not.

Felt like September this morning. Much less humid, 59*F at 7am. One of my fastest AM commutes - averaged 16.4mph over 10.6 miles, kept a steady 23mph over one flat section. I'm in IT, I look at the bike computer too much.

Tuesday was better though - passed wild turkeys in the AM and PM.

Great! Took new mtn bike on unpaved rails-to-trails gravel bed. Lots of fun. Not always going to have time for that though. And boy do I need a rack for that, I am one big lake of sweat now, esp. in the backpack zone.

Had a 6am platelet donation at BloodSource. It's relatively slow at work this week so I said "Make it a double!"

Rode the Caldaro to work today with its recently retorqued and loctited (loctitened? loctaught?) Italian bottom bracket. No noise, no rubbing, nothing but positive silence when pedaling and that gorgeous Campy whirring when freewheeling.

Hot and humid this morning. The ride went better than I expected considering I'm working on ~75 minutes of sleep. "The baby kept you up all night?", you ask. Nope, she slept thru the night as usual. I had practice late, got home exhausted but so wound up on adrenaline that I couldn't sleep all night.

I already told my boss I'm taking tomorrow off to deal with the inevitable crash.

Hottest yet for me. Temp is 104 and according to the local weather center (WRAL.COM) the heat index is 118 as I type (been home about 15 mins). I can do this for about an hour, but if I had another 15 minutes to go I think I would have had to make a cooling stop. I have a few big hills as well.

I did make pretty good time, so went a more direct route that took about a mile off my reguar route. 15.50 mi in an 1:03:06 moving - thankfully only about another 4 minutes not moving.