November 4 Rides

[kelownagirl]

Lisa, what kind of gloves did you get? I have some regular full finger ones but they're not going to be warm enough soon. (I want a balaclava, or at least afull head cover thingy. My ear cover things weren't quite warm enough last week.)

Wish I could get out on my bike. Well, I wish I could get motivated to get out on my bike...

barb

[BleeckerSt_Girl]

Lisa, what kind of gloves did you get? I have some regular full finger ones but they're not going to be warm enough soon.
barb

Barb, go to the thread titled "Ibex Ultimate Guide Sweater" under the "Apparel" category, that's where I talked about the gloves (pages 1 & 2). We were discussing some Ibex/Smartwool sweaters and warm items there.

[mary9761]

It was very cold when the alarm went of at 04:45 this morning, but it wasn't supposed to be bad later today and the forecast for the WINDS was SUPPOSED to nice too.
I got up, got my breakfast and headed for the bus downtown. Luckily the ride doesn't start until 09:00 now so it gives me time to be ON TIME! I got to town just as I saw the bus I needed coming into the loop YES!! I was going to make it. Now that daylight savings time is over AND the ride time is pushed back to 9 I've gained 2 hours of daylight basically compared to what I'd been riding in to the rides. I got to College and 96th St and headed over to the MONON. It's still chilly but at least it's light out.
I get to the park at 08:10 and have some time to kill so I head over to the BP to pull my leg warmers back up, get a banana and some HOT coffee. I grab my coffee and head back outside to my bike. Marlin sees me (he's come for coffee too) and say's "you're early!" I told him yeah, but it was the only way to be on TIME.. He gets his coffee and suprisingly we sit outside the gas station and have a nice conversation while killing time and warming up with the coffee. I finish my coffee before him and leave telling him I'd meet him at the park.
We all get signed in and I head out a few minutes before the rest of the group to get a bit of a head start. They always catch up to me so at least I get a few minutes with the group as they pass me.. One of these days, I'll have a REAL road bike and I'll be able to ride with the rest of the riders. The ride leader Tom catches up with me and in a rare occurence I have someone to ride to breakfast with. We get to breakfast after most of the others but luckily they haven't all eaten and left yet, I would have felt bad if I'm caused him to miss the group.
We have breakfast and I've decided to ride on to Cicero. The wind has picked up so I hope this isn't a bad decision. Tom rides with the rest of the group now and I'm on my own again. I can see the others for a while ahead of me, but as usual once we start in the rollers, they lose me quickly. They are already gone by the time I hit the turn around point in Cicero. The wind has definitely picked up again gusting at least into the 20's from the South. I will be fighting this again for my ride home. I'm thankful that it is JUST from the South so I don't have to fight headwinds in my long stretches in the the West heading back to the park. I make better time this week, but I'm tired and my quads are cold, stiff and screaming at me even with my tights and fleece leg warmers on. I make it back to the park and I'm glad that most of the open riding is out of my way, unfortunately for me, I now have nearly 20 miles going due South into the wind to head back to town on the MONON.. I ride down to as far South as 38th St and it's getting later in the day, I don't want to lose daylight and end up on the worst area of the MONON in twilight or dark (where a rider was attacked and left for dead a month ago when he was caught by some punks after dark) so I ride down to College Ave and catch the bus to town. My quads were NOT happy with me for all the cold abuse so I knew I was only going to become slower. I already have nearly 75 miles so, I don't feel like I've cheated myself out of a ride at this point. I stop for a few minutes at The Bike Line downtown to warm some more and visit with Jimmy before riding to the bus stop to catch my bus home. When I get to my street, I only need .50 a mile to get 75 miles so I ride up and down the street for a few more minutes to finish my ride.

30F when I left the house at 06:00 with a windchill of 23F BRRRRRRR it was a cold ride to town. My hands were going numb even with several layers of gloves, need to add more next time Temps climbed into the upper 40's with steady winds of 15+mph gusting into the 20's or so out of the South giving me headwinds through a good portion of my second half of my ride. I'm not sure what the windchills were, but it never really felt warm at all today.

[BleeckerSt_Girl]

Jeez Mary, that's some MAJOR brave riding!!

[mary9761]

Thanks Lisa,
the cold really got to me along with the wind, it's been VERY windy around here in Indy lately. last saturday I was fighting steady winds of 20-30+mph and gusts of 40-50+mph that really put a hurt on me for the better part of a 60+ mile ride. I almost pulled over to the side of the road and curled up into the fetal position for a good cry on that one. I like to never got up some of the same small hills at 3mph and had to stop several times. You know it's bad when you have to pedal DOWNHILL!!
I'll be glad when some of this wind decides to finally calm down, but I don't see it happening soon. My legs are STILL sore today and they cramped something fierce in my upper/inner quads when I tried to go to sleep Saturday night.