How Was Your Commute Today?

[Melalvai]

After riding my friend's road bike in yesterday's triathlon, getting my heavy commuter bike going took a lot of power. chug chug chug along. Reminded myself that riding Crush (the commuter bike) all year long is why the initial steep climb at the triathlon wasn't a challenge at all! That little light road bike just LAUNCHED herself up the hill. And kept right on going.

Fully loaded for my day, the commuter bike weighs in around 40 pounds. The road bike was well under 20. I could stand to shed another 15 off of myself, and then I'd really fly!

[redrhodie]

It's been a while since I commuted, but I'm baaaack! I can't tell you how much more I like riding my bike than driving my car. What a difference it makes. Car=Stress. Bike=Happy. I wish more people rode bikes. The world would be better. I really believe that.

Really fast ride tonight. I found my inner Merckx. Heh. The tailwind didn't hurt.

[ZenBiker]

Been thinking about how to extend my self propelled commuting season as the days get shorter and mornings get colder. We have a brand new (as of last spring) bus service in town, with a stop 1 block from the office and 2 miles from home, and a bike rack on the bus. Gave it a trial run today, riding into work and catching the bus to shorten my return trip. It's not fast, with all the intermediate stops the bus makes, but I can take work to do or a book to read. This might just work!

[Fredwina]

Still in Rensselaer:

across the bridge- Empire State Plaza:

Downtown Albany:

Still debating what to do about the bicyclst some of them are not exactly curteous - I thought we were supposed to share the sidewalk

[tzvia]

Sky King-
Good idea, the slime tubes. I'm a nerd and resistant to heavy tubes. But I found a slime light tube at the LBS so bought it for the back wheel. Gonna put it on the next time I flat. It weigh double what a good road tube weighs, but what am I weenie-ing about- 50 grams.

Got tubes with removable cores- and put an extra core in my patch box. I do this already for the road bike and MTB, I don't know why I didn't do this for the commuter.

My ride today was great. Not too hot, maybe upper 80s with a slight breeze. However, there were lots of sirens right behind me as I rode- several times I looked back, they seemed to stop a block or so behind me on Desoto... Got home and found out that there was a fatal accident. It must have happened right after I passed... Gives me the chills.

[7rider]

Brrrr...
45 degrees out this a.m. (7 C).
Had to pull out the jacket for my ride in this a.m. First time since....May?? maybe?

[divingbiker]

Yesterday while I was driving to the office, I was stopped on a downhill road in a line of traffic but had the green light at the bottom of the hill. A young guy on a bike was screaming down the hill (it's a wide road) to the right of the cars. An SUV was coming toward us and took the opportunity to turn left at the light through the stopped cars.

You know what's coming...the bike slammed into the SUV. I heard the impact, and saw the cyclist lying on the hood of the SUV for a few minutes. Once he started moving, I relaxed.

Miraculously, he was unhurt. He had one scratch. But there were a lot pedestrians and a crossing guard at the corner, and they insisted he go to the hospital. I stopped and asked if he wanted me to take his bike to my office and lock it up. He called me later and I dropped it off at his house on my way home.

He was so appreciative and said he was fine, except for some soreness. The windshield of the SUV was shattered. They didn't file a police report, but both the cyclist and I felt that he had the right of way since he had the green light and was going straight. Not sure what the police would have said.

He was one lucky young man.