Your ride today.... (part 1)

[gbb]

Boxing Day, set out to do my usual 18/20 mile loop in -2 degrees but fair weather...jeez, i turned round when my fingers started to go cold. Managed 14 miles

Christ, what have i got to do or buy to keep my hands warm. new Endura Windchill jacket and Endura thermal socks worked very well, actually felt rather snug barring my hands...i could honestly have cried when i got back, they were so painful.

Lots of Fieldfare about, a Bullfinch, little flock of Goldfinch...and a lovely sighting of a Buzzard right over the top of me. I actually stopped half way up a hill to watch him maybe 20 feet above me. You could see the full feather colours and barred pattern underneath him. Lovely sight.

Sick sick sick to death of this cold weather. Really hoped for a couple degrees above today, suns been shining...but...

 

[PatrickPending]

40Km first in almost 10 days, testing out the commuter as I had to do some work on the rear wheel - alls ok - back to cycling to work tomorrow. Seems strange to be riding the commuting bike in daylight....

 

[GordonB]

Pulled the bike out of the shed this morning then pulled the 8mm long flint out of the front tyre, fitted a new tube and finally set off to mother in laws for yet another roast lunch (I really don't need any more food for at least a week....) Weather not very nice, nasty drizzle and damned cold but hey, I need the exercise, and a 10 mile ride helps to compensate for the lunch.

Two miles down the road, a distinct wobble from the rear and yet another long, sharp flint manages to get through the UltraGatorskins. To add insult to injury the drizzle decides to up its act and turn into proper rain, and I remember I haven't got a pump with me as the replacement for the old portable one hasn't arrived yet. Stand and recite the magic word "bugger" forty or fifty times then use the mobile to phone wife and ask her to drive back from m-i-l's to pick me up.

Not one of my better days. I took a close look at the road surface while I was developing hypothermia waiting for wife, and it was littered with small flints, worse than I've seen before, doesn't bode well for the next few weeks and is like riding over a bed of caltrops.

Gordon

 

[twentysix by twentyfive]

Pulled the bike out of the shed this morning then pulled the 8mm long flint out of the front tyre, fitted a new tube and finally set off to mother in laws for yet another roast lunch (I really don't need any more food for at least a week....) Weather not very nice, nasty drizzle and damned cold but hey, I need the exercise, and a 10 mile ride helps to compensate for the lunch.

Two miles down the road, a distinct wobble from the rear and yet another long, sharp flint manages to get through the UltraGatorskins. To add insult to injury the drizzle decides to up its act and turn into proper rain, and I remember I haven't got a pump with me as the replacement for the old portable one hasn't arrived yet. Stand and recite the magic word "bugger" forty or fifty times then use the mobile to phone wife and ask her to drive back from m-i-l's to pick me up.

Not one of my better days. I took a close look at the road surface while I was developing hypothermia waiting for wife, and it was littered with small flints, worse than I've seen before, doesn't bode well for the next few weeks and is like riding over a bed of caltrops.

Gordon

The flints being the result of gritting do you think Gordon?

 

[GordonB]

The flints being the result of gritting do you think Gordon?

No, the flints are a fact of life in rural Suffolk. They wash off the fields, the big ones aren't too much of a problem but the small fragments are lethal to tyres. Generally the passage of cars tends to grind them down to a non-problem size or sweep them off the road but as there just hasn't been the traffic and lots of run-off from the fields they are more abundant than normal. The ones i pulled out of the tyres were like little spear points and quite literally as sharp as razors. In the past I've looked at these under a microscope (I have several!) and some are actually sharper than razors. Not surprising really, flint is very like glass in many respects and if it is fine enough in the grain you can shave hairs off your arm with a freshly broken piece.

Gordon

 

[craigwend]

A tad under 19 miles (now that the majority of the white stuff has gone) even out on road bike for a change

the horrible freezing fog did not spoil the ride; though I was very wet at the end of the ride, this with a combination of melting snow spraying up off the road and low cloud dropping from the sky

possibly one more ride before the end of the year?

 

[Hacienda71]

Commute for me today on the winter road bike, only the second ride of December on 23mm tyres. Snow, ice and festivities has reduced my mileage by 50% this month so getting to get out on the bike was a very pleasant change . Will try to squeeze a ride for pleasure in before the new year

 

[HLaB]

I'd forgotten how much fun this cycling m'larky is and how convenient it is. Tonight was a quick run to the pub and back, only 6 miles but fun :-)

 

[Bayerd]

Commute for me today on the winter road bike, only the second ride of December on 23mm tyres. Snow, ice and festivities has reduced my mileage by 50% this month so getting to get out on the bike was a very pleasant change . Will try to squeeze a ride for pleasure in before the new year

Does Mrs H know?

 

[gbb]

22 misty murky but mild miles along the river Nene...several days after the last of the sub zero temps, i was amazed to see the nene still has ice all along its banks, maybe 3 to 6 feet in. I'd have loved to see it when it was really bad.
Fog...its always so still, no breeze, so quiet...i like fog (well heavy mist anyway)
Cleaned the bike today, rode it, its filthier than when i started.

 

[Hacienda71]

Does Mrs H know?

It is more fun when Mrs H is involved but she does take some persuading

 

[Deleted member 1258]

Took a ride down to Wellesbourne today, first decent mileage done since December the 12th, with all the snow and ice I've restricted myself to just commuting. Started of in thick fog which didn't clear till after the Café stop, it was a cold damp grey hard ride. Coming through Norten Lindsey on the way out I turned down the hill towards Snitterfield and started building up some cadence, I was on the fixed, down the hill and tweaked my right calf, unfortunately I was spinning to fast to just pull my foot out and had to slow first. I stopped and had a few minutes to let it settle down then continued.When I left the café I went fairly directly home and got to Warwick before the combination of to little mileage, I hadn't ridden at all this week, and eating to much junk over Christmas started to catch up with me. 52 hard miles covered, It wasn't the most enjoyable ride I've done, and I'm sat here tonight totally knackered and with a sore right calf.

 

[Mad Doug Biker]

My sister was given an electric bike by one of her neighbours (former I think), and it had sat in her back garden for quite a while.
On Wednesday there, I decided to collect it and bring it back to the garage (where it would at least be undercover). Having not really seen it before, I soon wished I hadn't tried to ride it home as it was too small, was minus the battery (which was here already), but still weighed a ton, and it was icy!

I had decided to bring it back under the cover of darkness as, from what I had seen of it, it was a pretty goofy looking bike, complete with a basket , but what I hadn't bargained for was how icy the cycle track was, despite it having thawed elsewhere. It was like a sheet of ice!

Add the 4 factors of it being too small, being without its battery but still weighing a ton and it being icy together and I had a pretty torid time with it, me falling at least 3 times and all I can say is that I slept well that night due to its sheer weight. The distance was only about 4 miles too!

Electric bikes are meant to make life easier!

 

[craigwend]

Final ride of the year, the usual 10 mile - well actually 9.7 mile loop,

almost all of the ice has gone apart from one T-junction which required a bit of 'scooting' & unclipping.



So the year

3038.91 miles my new best-ist

171 rides

shortest recorded 1.77 miles at centre parks (why did I even record it?)

longest 120.92 miles (FNRTtC) York to Cleethorpes -> then home

This was a good year for riding - even if the begining was frozen & the end was generally snow-zen

 

[Toeclip]

Out this morning for the first time in five weeks, just over 12 miles and that was just enough for me!