I have a brake, but since I don't need it to regulate speed, I don't feel obliged to keep my hand near the lever. That was nice this morning when I put my hands in my pockets to keep them from freezing. Who'd 'a' thunk it?

just be careful with that. i had cold hand on a commute to work (dc messenger) in the snow. suffice to say, i was tired, another cyclist wizzed by me, and i ended up going over the bars knees meeting cold cement.

how fast can you regulate speed with your hands off the bars? I can slow down, but not that quickly.

Likewise. Hands-off skidding and such is WAY beyond my skill level. I mean I can adjust speed according to lighting and proximity to hazards, and slow down for turns that aren't too sharp. When traffic shows up, I go back to active steering and braking.

As I recall from Leonard Zinn's "Primer", pedalling is like going up stairs. Push hard on the downward moving pedal. Unload the upward moving pedal, but don't pull extravagantly. I've been trying to backpedal as if going down stairs, which is the opposite - push hard on the upward moving pedal. Unload the downward moving pedal but don't pull on it. That seems to give the best deceleration (without brakes) without putting tension on my sensitive knees. At least that's the mind set this newbie is experimenting with.

Here in New York...we use gloves

Yeah. Common sense is a reach before the first coffee. Before I left, news reported 34F in the "city" 30 miles away, so I wore the medium weight gloves. Get to work and check the mesonet, it says the temperature dipped to 28F here in the "burbs" right before sunrise. I'm o.k. with cold, not with frostbite. I think I'll be over-dressing for the rest of winter.

haha.. word on the gloves. i actually have re-occuring horrible thoughts and images of riding with my hands in my pockets, and then not being able to get them out on time to make a quick stop (picture brakeless). just pick up a pair of those goretex jawns with the grip bubbles on the palms, assuming you don't have grips or wrap.