wet wet wet... and chilly
Typical German winter :-)

Another warm January morning at 28 F (-2 C). It is difficult getting used to chilly mornings and warm afternoons in Jan, as this is usually the pit of winter along with Feb, for which I am not here.

very nice ride in, new front and rear pads mean a quiet stop. Temps just over freezing.

Warm ride in for this time of year. Fellow DC commuters rest easy. It'll be a warm winter free of snow. How do I know? I got studded tires for Christmas. :) So it should stay nice and warm straight through to the spring.

Day three riding clipless. Still no falls (knock on wood) and I'm gaining in confidence, but I'm trying to remain vigilant, lest I topple over at slow speed. It's almost happened twice so far. Really liking the new pedals and shoes so far.

45F and sprinkly, not bad. Today was my 7 yr old's 1st day commuting w/ hand brakes, she successfully used them to avoid getting flattened by a school bus.

http://home.comcast.net/~adrian_spidle/jan09.jpg

Coldest morning ride yet for me @ 37 degrees Fahrenheit. 14 miles commute. I know that does not sound too bad to many of you in colder climates (ala Chicago, Minnesota, Canada, etc), but for us in Arizona that is darn chily. I noticed on my last morning ride that my fingers (without full-fingered gloves), ears, and feet got the worst of the cold. So this time I wore wool socks, some full-fingered gloves, and a scarf over my ears and under my helmet. That with just a base-layer cycling jacket and pants made it not too bad at all. I think I am getting the hang of it.

Rural setting, 25 MPH speed limit, hill apex coming up, pickup truck coming up on me fast from behind, stayed my course and did not take the lane cause he was going real fast and seemed to have that I'm going to teach you a lesson line picked out.

Sure enough completely buzzed me over the crest of the hill. Raised my hands in bewilderment, police cruiser coming the other way ( which he didn't see entering the scenario because of the crest ) saw the whole thing. Pulled him over and he was telling me I was "parking" in the middle of the road ( I average around 18-19 MPH year round on my commute ). He got at least a ticket for speeding, I explained how uncomfortable I felt to the officer who seemed to "get it".

Older guy, truck covered in hunting stickers, typical non-sharing type trying to teach me a lesson. I'd like to think he got the lesson but I doubt it, he'll probably run me off the road next time I see him.

Other than that a beautiful morning and after fighting a cold for the last few days, seemed to have my wattage back and feeling good.

Be safe out there :)

No riding on the weekend or today. On Friday I slipped on some ice while walking around campus and landed flat on my back. A backpack containing a laptop isn't the softest thing, but it did cushion my fall. At least the way I fell my weight was pretty evenly distributed.

My back and neck was pretty stiff yesterday, but today I'm feeling much better. Another hot soak in the tub tonight and I should be ready to ride tomorrow.

30*F this morning, 37*F with a stiff SW wind (gusts to 25 mph) this afternoon. That wind was great when I was going east, but was a real bugger going south though. But hey, it's January and I'm riding. Life is good! :)

DNR (Did Not Ride) today and probably tomorrow - ice on the streets here in my hometown. It doesn't happen enough to justify buying studded tires here in the Desert - so I'll just relax a couple of days!

Super sweet on the first leg of the commute. Exited the train 3 stops ahead of my regular stop so I could ride some extra miles..;) Got to work late too. No matter, these extended rides are PRICELESS. I left the bike at work, and the wifee picked me up to take me to dinner.. Will get a ride a to work tomorrow, and ride home on the bike..

Life is dam sweet... ;)

I broke out the trailer today. Water softener is out of salt, so I stopped by the HW store on the way home. Riding with 40 lbs of salt in a trailer is taxing, so I slow way down, to like 10-11 mph. Today makes the SECOND time in my life that someone has actually pulled up to me to inform me how I'm endangering the life of my child by riding in traffic at night. Last time it was groceries and I was bad for it being below zero and me having them out. This time it was dark and in traffic. Still, loved the look on her face when I said..."Lady, its salt." :D Today also marked the 9th day in January when I rode my bike as transportation. The Truck is getting lonely.

Interesting ride back home. Didn't realize I can pump over 800W for more than 20 seconds... Basically, on the way back... going through some residential area... something caught corner of my eye on fringe of my light. Hmm... it's rather big... looks... like dog... looking at me... a loose doberman heading toward me... No growling, no barking... just approaching...
I had a little moment of... WT# and started spinning a little faster so our trajectories don't meet... Except, I see it changing its course. Couple of things flashes through my mind and I decided to gun it. Sure enough, it chases after me. I give it a little "Lance look"... and sure enough, it is only about 6ft behind me. Check my leg and I did have more so I just dump it like I would do in a minute interval training. After about 20 seconds of that... (felt longer than that but based on my powermeter and garmin..) it stopped chasing me. About 10 more seconds later, I see some kids playing outside on yard, taking stroll. And next thing coming to my mind is... I could run from it... but this kids?! Still upset about whoever is the owner of the dog letting it loose out like that. Could be stray but it looked a little too healthy for that.
I am not sure what to do in situation like this next time... Totally forgot about the water bottle water jet idea. Don't carry around pepper spray (I think I will look into it)...

First snow ride since last winter. It sure slowed me down, but boy it's so much fun!
-2C, very little wind = perfect

The ride in to work was my first day back on the bike after three weeks away. Those three weeks included too much time in our new car (for holiday travel; I hate driving, my wife hates it more) and illness (I had a nasty respiratory virus).

Boy did it feel good to get back in the saddle.

Before I had to lay up for a couple of weeks, I was down into the high 250s for the first time in seven years. I started to climb back up towards 260 (which I hit today) but getting back in the saddle should start me back on the downward slope.

It felt warmer than it looked, at least as much as anyone can tell in the dark. It was 34F (1C), and a very mild wind.

I had a beautiful snowy ride home last night as DC'd first snows came down. That conmbined with zipping by cars stuck in eternal city gridlock maded for an overall nice experience.

Quiet ride in this morning.

The ride home last night started out great. 50F and a partial tailwind. But after ~5 miles, I came to a 4-way stop and the guy to my left who had arrived a second before me refused to go. I continued to track-stand and jerked my head to the right while looking at him but he still didn't go. So I went. But during the track stand, my rear brake (a 25-year-old U-brake) became "mal-adjusted" and one of the pads was dragging. I couldn't get it to stay off the rim so I rode the remaining ~10 miles that way. It was very hard work and I was going very slow and I was trashed when I got home.

-1C with a bit of a tailwind. I took the touring bike this morning and made great time.

I turned my laptop on for the first time since falling on it last Friday. The bottom 1/3 of the screen is toast with various dead spots around the edge of rest of the display. If I resize the windows, it should be usable until I find a replacement.

Yesterday was my FIRST commute to work on my Strada, and it had a few issues (see my other post) but the ride home was great! So, today I was a little better prepared. I stopped at wally world yesterday evening and bought a cheap front light for the bike and when I left this morning I set it on blink. On the ride I noticed that I could see the light reflected back at me from the window of a house two blocks away. So that made me feel a little better about being seen on the road in the early morning dawn light. As it turns out, the ride was easy. Traffic was light, everyone behaved, I had a couple of easy highway crossings, caught a couple of the lights, and the traffic on the highway the last three miles was heavy, but no issue. All in all, it was a very positive experience. Tonight I plan to ride home the on the 'long' route and add a couple miles to the ride and see what that is like.

Tractor Tom in Okeechobee, FL

Back in the saddle after driving yesterday due to rain. It was a light but cold rain and I had some errands to run, plus my legs were tired from riding 230+ miles last week, so it seemed like a good excuse to drive. The day off did wonders for my legs and I felt great this morning. Forecasters were calling for heavy fog but I didn't see a whiff in my hour-long ride to work. Over the weekend I finally rigged up a mount for my Dinotte taillight on my backup commuter bike, and I felt much safer having that blazing red light behind me.

Rode my annual birthday ride on Sunday, which gets harder every year as the years and miles creep upward. I'll be 58 next week and got in 60.5 miles, which can be difficult in January but not a problem this year with the mild winter we are having so far.

Where did all that snow come from yesterday? Basically just a white rain though with as warm as it was. Made for a nice and pretty ride home with the puffy white flakes.

Nice ride in this AM. Had to chuckle at a WTF moment I had near home. I'm riding down the street (25 mph speed limit) when a passenger in a pickup (going the other way no less) felt the need to roll down the window and yell out, "get off the road a$$hole". I've been yelled at a few times before, but never from someone going the other way. It didn't bother me but it did make me think what chip you have to have on your shoulder to feel compelled to do that. I rode on happily and enjoyed the rest of a nice ride to the office.

A wonderfully boring commute to work today, no issues with cars/drivers, good timing on the traffic lights and a decent temperature (45 Deg.F) when I left the house.

Okay ride on the Metro and I'm thinking the engineer must have been looking in his mirror as I folded up my bike on the platform, since just as I got it folded and entered the train he closed the doors and took off! A bit of a crowd to get through whilst de-training, but overall not bad.

Rick / OCRR

Great to be back in Boston! 4 months in NYC was a blast but so nice to be back on my usual roads. great ride in on Comm Ave. tried out the new BU bridge bike lane- great improvement but it's already getting filled up with salt and sand- it needs sweeping! But so much better than before it is a world of difference crossing that bridge.

Experienced my first malfunction yesterday. Somehow I didn't complete shifting, and the chain popped off the front when I tried to accelerate through an intersection. Quick look back at the SUV behind me, dismounted, and ran across the street. Got the chain back and went on my way. Beautiful days here in the NE - low 30s in the am and mid 40s in the pm.

Quite warm 6C (around 43 Fahrenheit), dry and no wind. The only drawback: 4 dangerously ignorant car drivers and 5 pedestrians that do not look right or left, probably the result of the full moon :-)

On Monday, I lost my cleat covers, so that kind of sucked- but things were looking up this morning. The weather today was beautiful, it was sunny, mild, and dry. I headed out on my ride to work, and made it about 15 seconds down the road and my chain broke. I bought the chain about 2.5 weeks ago and it has less than 200 kilometers on it- so that really sucked. Walked my bike back home, switched to my road bike, moved my gear from my panniers to a backpack and headed back to work.

On my way home though, I hit a screw in the road and flatted. I had to pick up my bike and carry it home. And I didn't have cleat covers.

On the plus side of things, I found my cleat covers. I replaced the tube in my bike. I still have to deal with getting my chain replaced, but things are looking up. I hope!

A nice moon lit ride at 28f (-2C). As I was approaching an interchange, I noticed a red flashing light in the gutter just past an off ramp. As I got closer, I realized that it was a flip phone open. I saw a regular walker just ahead, and asked if it was his, and he said, "no." It is an odd place to lose a phone, possibly someone left it sitting on their vehicle and forgot it. Even that seems strange. It all gets filed under, "the things you see, when you cycle."

Another quiet, crisp ride in. Saw more than the usual number of bikes out, I counted four on the streets. Guy next to me at a stoplight had no gloves on but he seemed perfectly content.

14F/-10C with a light headwind. Slow. Up way too late last night, drinking way too many Sazeracs and Manhattans.

Saw some guy doing the trifecta of dumb. Sidewalk. Against traffic. Running a stop sign. He had studded tires. A car cut him off and he locked up to stop, making a stud-grinding sound.

Messy storm coming in tonight. Might be the end of Soho commuting for a while.