I commuted by bike for the first time this season today. Actually, my commute was a split commute. I left my car at work last night and rode home. Then this morning, I rode into work on the bike. The reason for doing this is because we are still working out a plan at my employer for secure bike parking. So, leaving my vehicle at work allowed me to keep the bike in the car once I got to work.
Last night's ride home was uneventful. I did a few extra miles, so it was around 25 miles in difference. But it was really just like going for a ride after work.
This morning's ride was a little different. I live about 21 miles away from the office, so it will take over an hour to get into the office. Therefore, this morning I was up at 6:00 AM and one the bike headed in at 6:30 AM. When I got on the bike this morning, it was cold--37 degrees cold. Plus, there was a decent wind out of the northeast at 12-15 mph. So the windchill was down around 30 degrees. The first half mile was cold. Then your body seems to adjust. I was OK until about mile 16. Then my hands started to get cold. I was happy to get to the office, because I just couldn't get my hands warmed up again. It was just a little chilly for that.
The other factor that made the ride hard was that wind. For me, it was a headwind the whole way in this morning. So the whole ride was just a grind. It wound up taking me one hour, 22 minutes to get from home to the office. That is an average speed of only 15.6 mph A lot of that was going into that stiff breeze the whole way. Part of it was probably due to the cold, and I was burning a lot of energy to stay warm. Finally, at 6:30 AM, I just have a problem getting the body all cranked up and going fast. I started in a grind it out mode and stayed there the whole ride. That is actually a good description of the ride--a grind. It wasn't fun, it was work. Just a grind.
I got into the office, got showered and changed and then it felt like any other day. I was hungrier than normal, probably from burning all that energy first thing in the morning. But after lunch, that went away too.
I was happy that I did this. It forced me to get out and get a little cold weather training. It also converted an hour of car commute time into bike/training time. It saved me probably 2 gallons of gas. And while it was a grind getting in this morning, there was a certain sense of accomplishment after I got in. Yes, it was cold and much less than ideal conditions, but I overcame those anyway and completed my goal of getting a commute in. There is a certain satisfaction that.
The next couple of mornings are supposed to have overnight lows of 32 degrees, so I think commute #2 will probably wait until next week though.
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