Tales from today's commute....

[C R]

I know, its always someone else's fault. How do they get the money to buy these things at 16?.

Multiples of them even, like the moron interviewed in the BBC piece.

 

[captain nemo1701]

Multiples of them even, like the moron interviewed in the BBC piece.

I had to laugh at his 'its eco friendly' comment. Sadly, these are the ones I see racing on the B2B Railway Path at high speed during main commuting hours for their kicks. Walking to our local Tesco last weekend, I saw one pulling a wheelie all the way along the street about 5 yards behind a car.

 

[Jon in Sweden]

First road commute with studded tyres today. Temperature just above freezing, but snow showers forecast for later.

I use 35mm Schwalbe Marathon Winter Plus on my CaadX. They are slow, but quite secure on tarmac with snow and ice.

Also added an extra headlight to the rig. 1200lm to go with the existing 1600lm. Totally unnecessary brightness (more than car headlights on full power) but means I can run them both on low power and the batteries last ages.

 

[fossyant]

Fair bit of tree debris on the paths this morning meant it was a bit treacherous, and there was a tree down on the Fallowfield Loop near Athol Road..

Cycling the last mile into work, in a 20 zone, I was just outside of the mandatory cycle lane due to the debris in it. Van driver takes offence, overtakes and swerves into the cycle lane blocking me. I just cycle past and look at him. This then set's him off, roars after me, but get's stuck in traffic. He then chases after me and pulls along side spouting all sorts of obscenities. I just shout back his liveried van company name and tell him he's reported, and repeat it - didn't stop him, spent more time screaming out of the window than looking where he was going.

Didn't quite get the reg properly, but the company appears a little tin pot building company with just two directors - probably one of them. No web site or anything. This guy was mental, just total rage. I didn't swear, just repeated I was reporting him.

 

[Jenkins]

First commute after a couple of weeks of work and it wasn't too bad this morning. There's a nasty lump of rain that's been sat over here for the past couple of hours which wasn't forecast and, if it doesn't clear in the next hour and a half, the emergency waterproofs will have to be brought into action.

 

[fossyant]

The equilibrium is back in balance today. Let out of side roads by at least five drivers, some even where I had no priority – i.e. coming off a bridleway. Said hello to all my usual morning dog walkers and to some less known ones – one collie dropped his ball in front of me when climbing a steep hill – think he wanted to play. And nodded to my usual fellow cycle commuters. Weather a bit rubbish but, hey ho.

Told a colleague about waterproof boots and waterproof overshoes - she's getting fed up with wet soggy trainers every day.

 

[biking_fox]

Pretty rubbish cycling for a nominally 'dry' forecast. Heavy drizzle. Not as bad as the 2! street cleaners stuck on the oxford road cycle paths (totally blocking them) with their rear containers over-full spilling leaves back out again.

 

[fossyant]

I missed the worst - started spitting shortly after leaving home, and left the waterproof's off till I'd got the climbing out of the way, and stopped in North Reddish Park (about half way) to pop the rain jacket on. Just drizzle.

 

[Andy in Germany]

Pretty rubbish cycling for a nominally 'dry' forecast. Heavy drizzle. Not as bad as the 2! street cleaners stuck on the oxford road cycle paths (totally blocking them) with their rear containers over-full spilling leaves back out again.

What is it with blocking cycle lanes and pavements? I asked someone once and they indignantly responded "but there's no space on the road" as if that explained everything.

Apparently your journey is less important if you don't travel by car.

 

[Arjimlad]

I've been adjusting my routes to avoid some flooded roads here and there but yesterday evening I dropped down a steep hill to find this seven inches of rainwater over about 50 yards around a junction.

Kept the pedals up out of it somehow!

 

[Alex321]

Nothing coming down from the sky this morning, in fact clear and by the time I got to work, sunny. But quite a lot of water on the roads still, with a couple of places having flooded bits I couldn't avoid.

Temperature down to 5C at the coldest part of the ride.

 

[cyberknight]

Nearly ran over a suicidal squirrel yesterday,saw something at the side of the road but was not sure what it was till i was passing it and it did the " do i run unto the hedge ? nah i will try to run in front of the oncoming danger trick "

 

[cyberknight]

And nearly wiped out by a small lgv who decided to overtake on a bend into oncoming traffic and guess what? Yup sod the cyclist

 

[Jenkins]

Quick change of bike this morning as the main commuter had a soft tyre after yesterday evening's wet ride - I think the very slow untraceable leak has reached that stage. Lovely start to the day other than that with clear skies, not too cold and a superb sunrise over the North Sea. Glad I keep an emergency 'to see with' light with all the other bike stuff in my locker as Iended up unexpectedly doing an extra couple of hours at the end of the day which meant it was fully dark by leaving time and I hadn't fitted a 'to see with' light to the replacement bike.

 

[palinurus]

Forecast looked horrible last night, heavy rain, 90% probability pretty much all day- except there was a lower probability between 6 and 7 so I got up at 5:30 to take advantage-- and the forecast had updated overnight and now there's 50% chance of light rain at three o'clock! Precipitation forecasts can change quite a lot over a few hours but rarely see such big turnaround. There is a fat band of rain to the South so...

Nice ride in, cool- on the cusp of chilly.