Some pic from yesterday's Pedaling the Prairie, up in Hempstead. I did the 45 mile route, the wife did the 24. Weather was gorgeous. Had a great time.















I wish this turned out better- it was cool seeing the riders against the horizon, but it didn't translate well to a photo

Looks like great weather! Unfortunately, we had to be in Austin for a Spinning instructor certification class and had to miss the ride. On the bright side, my new bike came in almost three weeks early and I was able to pick it up today. Looking forward to a chance to hopefully ride it this week or next weekend.

pics!

Only have one so far. Will hopefully get some better ones in the next few weeks.

damn son that is tight

I was supposed to be out there for the ride, but I went out to the golf course instead (have a tournament on Friday I needed to practice for). One of my riding buddies was there and said it was a good ride. He said it was busier than normal Ready2Roll rides (as should be expected), but it was good experience for him being in larger groups because he hasn't ridden in any large rides in several years (last one was '11 MS 150).

I did the 55 mile route on Pedaling the Prairie. Made one wrong turn and did just shy of 60. Gorgeous day, great ride, good beer at the end.

CRAZY fog getting out there. Like soup. At one intersection there was a car on the other side of the road stopped, and all I could see was an outline of his headlights, this was just before sunrise.

Wife and I set out on the 45 mile route, but she wasn't having good day, so we turned around at the second rest stop and rode back to the start. Ended up being about 32 miles. On the way back we saw a coyote less than 50 feet from the side of the road. Pretty cool. What an awesome day for a bike ride. Then to finish it off with pulled pork sandwiches and No Label. Oh man, that tasted sooo good.

Man y'all are making me jealous. I spent all day that day inside the UT rec sports center wishing I was outside riding. For about the last 5 years, that Pedaling the Prairie ride has usually been on a weekend with really crappy weather (cold, windy, damp, etc). So bummed that the one time I miss it, it is beautiful outside. This weekend I am going to San Antonio to visit in-laws. I am taking my new bike though so I should be able to get in a couple of hours of riding around the hills out there. Will be back in town for the Cat Spring ride...looking forward to getting back on the road after a couple of weeks of nothing but spinning.

Looks like we're going to miss the R2R Sealy ride this weekend. Bummed about that. Cat Springs was a good ride last year.

Yeah, the Sealy and Cat Spring rides are both good. They end up sharing quite a bit of the same routes if you do the longer options. The ones I really look forward to each year though are the later rides like Fayetteville, Chappell Hill, Columbus, and New Ulm. New Waverly is a good one too, but it is such a long drive from my house...

I'll be out there this weekend at the Sealy ride. Not sure how many of my normal riding buddies will make it, but at least I'll be there.

I've never did Ready2Roll in the past, so I'm unfamiliar with each week's route. The email mentions this weekend's Sealy ride gets into gentle rolling hills; what exactly are they like? What kind of grades? Any long climbs, or is it just a bunch of short up-and-down hills?

Mostly gradual rises. Nothing very steep and nothing very long. I don't think it is much hillier than the first few miles south of 290 along FM359. The route goes from Sealy west towards Columbus along back roads. You stay south of Cat Spring. It is mostly nice quiet roads and decent pavement, and I don't think of it as all that hilly in general. More like mostly flat with a few small hills. There are a couple of points along Kulow Road early in the ride where you climb up out of a creek bottom where you will find out who knows how to shift and who is still learning. For anybody used to riding hills, it will be no big deal. For anybody who has ridden nothing but pancake flat terrain, it will feel different, but still isn't very hard.

Loops like we'll be missing this weekend's ride too. Valentine's day hoopla in the early afternoon. We are getting picked up by friends for a thing at 12:45 and I don't think we'll have time to ride, drive back, and shower before going.

Hi Texas bikers.

I am new to riding and will do my first MS150 this year. My son really enjoyed Pedalling the Prairie last week because of the free candy from (Sweet Tooth shop?) at rest stop 3 on the 45 miles route.

Howdy! And thanks for doing the MS150. I have MS, so thanks very much for riding and raising money for the cause!

Hi Txags92,

It will me my pleasure riding the MS150.

My heart and health have substantially benefited from the weekend training rides. Now, if only I can beat my wife in the fundraising department. With company matching, she has raised $1000 already.

My first fundraising step is to do a "garage" sale.

As it turns out, I'll be at the R2R Sealy ride this weekend. Wife and daughter are going to miss out though. Looks like great weather.

Yeah weather looks great. Really bummed we can't make it tomorrow. We'll be seeing a musical, hitting up a swanky dinner, then heading to the Toyota center to see Bob Seger from the company box. Gonna be a great day even without the riding.

On a side note, my wife and I don't know a ton of people and have a hard time raising a lot for the MS150 so if anyone is willing to donate send me a PM and I'll link you to our pages. Thanks!

Yesterday's Sealy ride was a lot of fun. Weather was perfect, the route was nice and secluded with very little traffic (did the 45 mile route), and the turnout seemed to be pretty good. I did seem like the first stage only went uphill the entire way and that there was more wind than I though their would be ( at least we were into it on the way out and not the way in), but it was nothing bad at all.

Only thing I'd critique is the "river crossing" we were warned about in the announcements. He kept talking about the water and how it might be slippery (and repeated the same thing about 5 or 6 times), but he never said anything about the horribly rough pavement leading up to and as you cross it. I swear on the way out, the center of the pavement immediately in front of the crossing looked like a giant pothole, and I skidded a bit on the crappy pavement trying to avoid it at the last second. At least I'll know that's there for next year's ride.

Glad it was good. Sad to miss it. Was OK though because we saw a fabulous show at the hobby theater them had a dinner at Prohibition, then saw Bob Seger at the Toyota center from the company box. And it rocked my face off. Guy's still got it. Hopefully going for a jaunt today.

Yeah, once you cross that creek, there is a lot of uphill. Having a west wind probably just made it seem worse than it was. The ride back to sealy was probably fun with that wind though. I managed to get in 28 very hilly miles out north of San Antonio yesterday. Looking forward to some flatter terrain next weekend for the second ride on my new bike.

I'm surprised nobody mentioned that junk yard dog, that was trying to eat everybodies tires. I thought the roads sucked as well.

Hahaha, I forgot about that. He ran off as we went by, but I saw him going after the bikes up ahead of us.

Best thing we've seen so far though was on the Fulshear ride a few weeks ago. I saw my buddy's head do a double-take over into a field, and sure enough there was a bull mounted up on a cow getting it done.

I was hoping that dog would be dead by now. It's there every year. Lol the woman has about 5 more, but that's the only bad one out of the bunch.... I think.