engstrom

Not just Dallas, all across Texas:

https://www.oncor.com/news/newsrel/detail.aspx?prid=1290

ravenmore

Yeah, I got hit this morning right after I woke up. Before dawn. Couldn't see a darn thing. Texas has a great electrical grid. I've never seen anything like this in my 43 years here.

normandy83

Got an email that Atmos Energy (natural gas provider) is also having trouble keeping up, so they can't keep all pipelines fully pressurized. Asking folks to back off natural gas use.

revchuck

It's slightly better here in NOLA - 37 degrees, 20 mph winds, spitting rain, 29 degrees with the wind chill. I wimped out on my ride this afternoon, and will drown my embarrassment in bourbon.

that-guy

three snow days in a row!

2manybikes

2" of water and slush everywhere. Temp is now down to 26f low 19f tonight. The only thing that will go on all this ice tomorrow is my snow/ice bike.

ravenmore

22 degrees and dropping again. AWESOME!

that-guy

18 currently and headed down to 9 tonight.

dnmhc

You knew it was bad when the players from up North were complaining about how cold it was inside the covered stadium.

cruelster

We had to turn down the heat at work for because of that same issue. They told our facilities manager, turn the usage down or they would turn it down for us. Needless to say, it was a short day at work.

chadwick

I'm really, really glad I didn't post that mocking story about riding in winter when it was 74F last week.

I'm not sure I actually own enough clothing to go ride tomorrow when it's 25F w/ 10 mph north winds. But, I'll try. Brr. The ice shows up at noon.

Kuotient

Cold temps (20s) in Austin didn't stop me from bustin out the long johns, layering up, and riding around campus today! Although the only ice around here are at fountains.

At one point I did lose a pair of my gloves sometime around lunch...that wasn't as fun of a ride back home..

Doohickie

I would try riding but the ice is really over the top ridiculous. They just throw some sand on the hills and call it good. Everything else is icy.

transamman1999

i still rode for 30mins in bibs, short-sleeve jersey and no socks!!!! (on my brand new set of rollers inside my apt that is lol)

it's actually funny to be getting some good time in the saddle while looking out my window watching people slide their cars around the frozen streets of Uptown. heard tons of skreeching but no accidents.

the dudes in that vid are just retarrded. as fun as cycling in SNOW would be, trying to cycle on PURE ICE is just stupid dangerous. one slip, post out your arm to brace yourself, snap it like a twig in the cold and there goes your season. at least they were wearing helmets.


EDIT: seriously? the word "r e t a r d e d" gets auto-corrected to "********"??? it's not the f-bomb. it's just a word

ravenmore

I used to live near Uptown - I was on McKinney near Knox. I absolutely loved living there. I was in town recently and visited the old digs. Lot of growth in that area.

ravenmore

About 20 in Austin right now. 'Only' got to 18 last night. We haven't had any snow or ice yet, but that might change today. Pic of the fountain out front:

tcs

No riding in DFW today? Tour de HTFU:

2manybikes

Studded MTB tires make riding on ice about the same as riding on pavement. It is much easier than riding in snow. Low pressure fat tires go straight over the frozen foot prints. Any good rider should tuck and roll automatically. Sticking out an arm is absurd.

When the lake ice is nice and thick (safe), but it is a warm day the top of the ice is not very slippery. One can ride on it without studs. Just don't tip the bike when you turn.

HMF

Rode in long johns and wool socks today in 25 degrees. Honestly, temperature milestones are harder than distance milestones. A century? pff. I nearly lost my toes today.

ravenmore

damn - getting below 20 again. Sheesh - for Texas that's pretty serious. We haven't been above 30 for 3 days now.

cruelster

We're supposed to get another light dusting of snow tonight. Should be getting an inch in North Dallas. Crap.

kf9yr

When I was a kid in WI we would put screw sheet metal screws through the inside of our tires so the points were coming out the threads. Then we'd line the inside of the tire with duct tape and reinflate the tires.

Then we'd have races on the pond...

I moved to AZ a few years ago and now pass on rides unless its over 40 (well, I'll go out if it's below 40 for a couple of days and I need to scratch my cycling itch...)

Hope your weather warms up soon in TX, I know your houses etc aren't built for it any more than ours in AZ are.

Treat those Packer fans well!

StephenH

Well, that was a little adventure.

I rode down the White Rock Creek trail and around White Rock Lake.

I took my cargo tricycle, "The Thing", to a parking lot at Forest and 75 where the Tuesday/Thursday GDB rides normally start. I got there about 6:45, and it looked like a solo ride was the plan. I went over to where we normally ride off the parking lot onto the trail, but that looked slick, so I went back north a few yards and found a less-slick spot and got on the trail and headed off.

The trail overall is about half pavement and half ice right now. Fortunately, a lot of the steepest places either didn't accumulate ice, or it melted and ran off before it could refreeze. But there were definitely some problem areas.

The first of these was where the trail goes under the Dart line at an old bridge. The trail drops down to that point and is then sort of banked the wrong way. So I got to that point and slid off the trail. I found that steering into a skid works great with The Thing, and I was able to keep it upright and then ride back onto the trail.

I went over the two bridges with wooden planks and discovered an interesting effect. The ice had built up on top of the planks, but didn't fill in the gaps. The result was that each plank was built up into kind of a round cross section. So it was like riding over a log bridge, much bumpier than normal.

I got down to the trail detour at Northwest Highway and saw the first pedestrian, walking between the liquor store and the Dart station. As I passed him, he said, "You're working!!?" I guess he thought I was out selling ice cream or something, I don't know.

I got down to the lake and thought about turning around there, because I could tell it would be cold riding back into the wind. But just about then I was riding with a tailwind and hit some clear pavement and decided to go for it. I went around the lake counterclockwise like we had done on Monday night. That helped, but there was still about a mile of riding directly into a cold wind coming over the lake.

I got about halfway back up the other side of the lake and found problem spot #2. The road splits, and signs say "Keep right". Keeping right sends you over a little hill. I was going to keep left since no one was around. But just as I got up there, a police car pulled up beside me. I don't know if he was admiring my form or was fixing to bust me if I rode 100 yards going the wrong way or what, so up the hill I went. It was hard ice, though, and I got about 2/3 of the way up and had to hop off, walking in the grass, and push. And had to do that some more negotiating the downhill on the other side.

The west side of the like was pretty clear, but the east side had a lot of ice on the road. Amazingly, a lot of that ice was blown into a wave-pattern, similar to how sand gets shaped at the beach.

Just after i passed under Hwy 75, I saw the second pedestrian of the night. I think I saw 2 cars on Lawther Road on the west side of the lake, and saw the policeman on the east side. I saw one car parked with a man and woman out looking at the ice. That's it. No joggers. No other bicycles. I did see a bicycle track in the ice in several places (see the photo above from tcs, which is at White Rock Lake!), so I wasn't the first one to ride out there.

I got back up to the parking lot, and tried to get back up the way I had come down, and it was too slick. So it took me a couple of minutes of tugging and kicking heel holes in the ice to get The Thing back up into the parking lot.

I wore my jeans with polypro long johns, polypro top, 3 long-sleeve jerseys, my old ski mittens, and my hiking boots. My hands stayed pretty warm until I took off my mittens to reload The Thing back in the pickup. My feet were gradually gettting colder as I rode. I had room for another pair of socks and should have worn them. I had globs of ice in my beard from the condensation of my breath.
Total distance, 20.9 miles, average speed, 9.1 mph. Internet shows 23 degrees or so.

10 Wheels

Cool adventure.....

Kuotient

Roads in Austin are iced now with light powder. Just road home from the gym. Was scary initially with my Gatorskins, and with the rear wheel slipping a couple times, but was pretty fun. Saw buncha other students sliding down hills on cafeteria trays.