Interesting commute this morning. I didn't ride Thursday due to cold rain all day with threat of snow/sleet, so I wanted to ride today to keep my driving to one day/week. The rain stopped last night but roads were still damp this morning with temperatures hovering just above the freezing mark (34F/1C). When I checked the weather at 5:30 am, the forecasters were warning about possible black ice on the roads, so I wasn't sure if I should risk it. Instead, I left a half-hour later than usual after it became apparent that the temperatures would stay above freezing. Fortunately I didn't encounter any ice and the traffic was lighter than usual due to the weather. Tried out some new bib knickers I got for Christmas, and they weren't really warm enough for low 30s, and I had red stripes around the bottom of my legs by the time I got to work. Forecasters are calling for another winter storm tomorrow with below freezing temperatures for several days, so it might not be safe to ride for a few days since I don't have the gear for riding on snow/ice.

slow ride this morning...just felt like I couldn't get enough oomph...very lethargic - I think I might be coming down with something - or the Extreme Bike Commuting gods are upset with me for not biking in the cold rain yesterday and have cursed me with lethargy. Anyway, not too bad this morning - thankfully no black ice encountered.

Repeating what tarwheel and jterribili reported, conditions were iffy but fortunately turned out fine. I was especially worried because it was in conditions like these that I had a fall 2 years ago, but today's ride was fine.

After the rain yesterday, which froze into black ice....I chickened out this am. Plus it was 14f with 15mph of wind. :-(

I am not as hardcore as I would like to be.

Though the conditions of this morning's commute may seem otherwise, I had the best commute ever this morning. It was the maiden voyage of my new Scattante XL Cross bike built up by one heck of a wrench at Performance Bike. My usual ride is a Novara Randonee or Fuji Team carbon. However, the Scattante's cross geometry, going 700 x 35s on tires, and having some tread (it was 38 degrees, windy, and pouring rain) was fantastic. The posture, the fit, the smoothness of the ride, and my overall impressions of this bike made the commute outstanding!

TXBiker

Good commutes yesterday. It was wonderful to have the studs stop their dry-pavement buzzing for the first time in over a month, and the scenery was wonderful. Alas, the stuff will all melt today.

Paul

I rode home through the snow on slicks last night, which proved interesting. There was even more snow this morning, so on went the studs. Sadly, just enough cars had been through to churn all the powder into crud, which is never fun to ride through.

Yesterday was a real mess going home. The snow started around 10am and changed over to rain in the late afternoon. For my ride home at 5pm it was still raining and there was from between one to three inches of slushy snow accumulated on the trail. Given the morning forcast I had put on my wheels with the Schwalbe Marathon Winter studded tires. While it was slow going through the heavy stuff, the real problem was my glasses fogging up severely limiting visibility. Almost didn't see the trail was blocked in one area where a stand of bamboo was bent over. My usual 25 minute commute was about 38 minutes.

Overnight the temperature remained around freezing so everything crusted up. It was very difficult to find a clean line to ride without frozen ruts and footprints. The ride was easier with the studded tires than a similiar ride in early December with just knobby tires. Even so, crossing a couple of overpasses the rear was fishtailing. The 22 minute commute ended up being 35 minutes. Didn't see a single other cyclist this morning, but it looked like there was one fairly fresh tire track going in the same direction. It's supposed to warm up to the low 40s so it will be back to slop for the ride home. Got to get some fenders!

Cloudy and warmer (above freezing, below 40F I think though), still not really windy. 1mph faster over 7 miles w/o 4 block diversion biking 6 yr old to school.

Lobster mitts $69.99, neck gator $10, ski goggles $39.99; Commute to work in 3 degrees with a -16 windchill...priceless. Nice sunny morning. Added some psi, which reduced some of the sluggishness experienced yesterday. Still, I'm quite sure I saw a tortoise wiz by, not sure, as it was just a blur.

They're predicting a low tonight of -15 with windchills of -26 to -37 this afternoon. Hmmm, note to self, might be wise to leave on time tonight

Almost went down hard this morning. Perfect morning mid 40's and sunny, cruising along nicely when a van that was parked to my right pulls out right in front of me and does a complete U-turn. I tried to bail to the right, just about where the van was parked; bad move, another van is parked in the space ahead. Now I'm coming at the parked van, braking and starting to skid, luckily I was able to unclip fast enough to put a foot down to prevent me from going down either into or under the parked van. It just shows that you can be doing everything right like riding in the middle of the lane, using lights (even in daylight), and still get nailed. A big f*** you to the jagoff in the 1980's p.o.s. black van this morning, you are the textbook example of a ******bag American happily putting away in their huge, ugly, gas guzzling, smog belching pile o' crap!
There, I feel much better now.

Only two things wrong with this morning's ride:

1) Its duration: too short.
2) Its destination: work.

+1

I'm going to start riding further in the mornings, the quick ride in is starting to become too mundane.

this week's ride in and out was wet and windy, not cold at all. Wet slippery pavement and too much reflections on the wet asphalt in the city, feels a bit unsafe , I fear cars ( their drivers) wont see me very clearly when it gets dark.Sometimes I ride back home at 18:00, feels great to avoid all this jammed traffic, I'll be on my way 40 minutes before the most of them.But Hell, they can take their bike as well !!
It's been two months now on my new folding bike ( Dahon Speed D7) and it still makes me smile !It is really holding up well!
I wish you all a great weekend, enjoy !

It warmed up a tad. Still no commute.
Going to try for my January century tomorrow and I need everything my legs have in them.
The starting temp should be around 10 with a balmy 34F fore casted as the high. I won't commute below 15F but I will start a century below that mark? My logic makes no sense.

My first commute of the year today! The medical specialist I'm seeing about my knee injury said I should give it a try because, if done in a certain way, it can act as physiotherapy of sort. I had to go to a meeting with a student only about three-four miles away, where I could bike on back streets and over relatively flat terrain. I figured that would be the perfect opportunity to ease back into cycling.

What can I say. The weather was beautiful, I wasn't feeling too bad either (not surprising - I was crawling along at about 10 mph most of the way ). The biggest problem turned out to be the bike. It was okay on the way to the meeting, but I guess parking it in the cold did something bad to it. On the way back, if I stopped pedalling even for a split second, the cassette would not reengage without a lot of fiddling. So on the way back I was not so much trying to guard my knees (though that too), as attempting to keep pedalling at all cost. I mostly succeded, though I had to stop at one stop sign. The annoying part is that after I stopped, the woman who drove to the interesection first started waving me through... and I could not go! However, I am particularly proud about perfectly timing the only traffic light on that short ride.

Chephy,

I have to disagree with you. Although it was mostly clear outside, the weather was not beautiful. Winds gusts in T.O were up to 60km/h that's crazy

Yuo know that dusting of snow that greases every bit of ice like Teflon? Found some and ate icy asphalt again today! Three times so far this year! Going too fast on a MUP that has a tunnel and then an incline out of it. Of course, at the end of the tunnel on the uphill side was a THICK ice patch that was chunky with footprints, some tire marks and repeatedly frozen runoff. Had time to pucker and WHAM-O! Down for the count...Covered in muddy slush, sore from taking the hit on my elbows and knees and still laughing. It all happens too fast to worry about sometimes...might have to re-mount the studs for the rest of the week...more snow expected.
Good thing I was dressed for riding home in 5 degree weather! Saved me from rashing myself!

Other than that lovely ride in..
Got a nod and wave from another commuter a couple of miles out from work. That was nice! Not the only one on this side of town...

Yesterday was crazy. About halfway home I was headed south and I noticed a couple cop cars headed north. No big deal. I passed through a stop sign and hit a red light. As I was waiting for the light to change, I heard more cops going north through the stop sign. I looked back and saw a van stopped towards the right side of the road with a cop stuck behind it. The cop was obviously trying to get through, not pull the van over, but the van just kept sitting there. The funny thing is that the cop had plenty of room to get through. I'm not sure who was being dumber in that situation. Finally the van moved a little and the cop went through. I got a good laugh out of that and then the light changed. Rubberneckers slowed things down just enough that I just missed my turn arrow.

I heard more sirens as I was waiting for the next green light. All of the sudden the cops were headed south, not north. Just as my light turned green a good 5+ cars came from behind to pass. A white car was in front, and I wasn't sure if it was being chased or if it was an unmarked police car. If it was being chased the driver must have had some pretty big balls to drive on the wrong side of the road like that. By the time everyone had passed I was left with just enough time to sprint through the intersection and hit the Monon Trail. As I was on the trail I heard tons and tons of sirens.

I didn't know what to make of the whole situation. I was thinking I had witnessed a chase, but I wasn't sure. It turns out that I was right: https://www.indystar.com/apps/pbcs.dl...=2008801180416

Major bummer - had to drive in this AM but planned on riding home. Looked forward to it all day but less than 10 minutes down the road I realized I'd forgotten my headlight. Went back to the office and ransacked my desk, my pack, office bathroom where I changed clothes - everywhere. By the time I FINALLY found it (slipped behind the file cabinet and under my spare sweater - grrr) I had only 45 minutes left to make an hour and a quarter long ride. Couldn't be late to dinner and it was getting dark. Had to put the bike back on the car and drive.

Stupid sweater.

Oh well, there will be other days.

25 mile RT commute for Friday. Another nice January day in Orange County, clear skies, no smog, light breeze. I tried out a Fenix LED flashlight (2 AA batteries) mounted on the stem for a front headlight on the way home. First impression is good, pretty bright light and the cars seemed to notice of me as well as my larger lighting system.

Uneventful ride in last night. Cold with a few flurries. this morning's ride home was colder with a dusting of snow. I stayed warm enough but the ride was lacking something. I got into my driveway which is pretty much solid ice with a dusting of snow and decide to "play" a little. I hammered on the pedals and spun the rear tire. It quickly got out from under me and started to come around. the front tire started to slide with it and I was sure I was gonna go down. By the time I got my foot out of the clip I was already straightend out. Somehow I managed not to fall but I did rip one of the stitches in my back loose. I'm sure by now my Dr. hates me.

the air temp was - 9 f, with -26 f windchill, and I commute at night. I chickened out.

That's what was in the forecast. I haven't experienced any of those winds out there though. The gusts were 20 km/h tops, and otherwise it was just calm for me.

Did you end up biking in 60 km/h head- or crosswinds? I've done that a few times?.. Yikes. It's exhausting in the former case, and very scary in the latter. (If that's a tailwind, that's a little scary too, since you can easily pass freely-flowing car traffic with that though, as long as they're not doing too much over the speed limit. )

Wow! What a day!. This morning it was 27f. A light 10mph sw wind. Stopping at the BP had another cager say to me "You're crazy!". That's the third one this week. Then this afternoon the temps drop to 21f with the windchill at 9f. It felt like it. I had to stop and put my headband on because my ears were getting cold under my balaclava. I had my glove liners on under my mittens but my thumbs were still getting cold. I'll have to double up on the liners. Back in Dec. I remember ridin' in 13f, but I think today felt colder. Had to ride down High St. to Graceland and got quite a few double-takes from folks. I'm planning on going out tom'rw sometime in the morning to get a taste of some single digit ridin' to see how my gear works in it and if I have to make any changes. The toesties I bought from Performance are working great with the Snow Sneakers, toes don't get cold anymore.
_________________