Tuesday, December 16, 2008

Wow how cold is it

This morning as I stepped off the front porch it was 15. Much like the entire country the cold of winter is pounding on us. This being my first winter bike commuting I have learned a few things. Like the rain gear that I bought does not stop the cold very well. I also need to get some boots and some better gloves.

Because I live in the PNW were there is water of some type falling from the sky often. I thought rain gear would be a good buy. I still feel that it is, however I do have some very nice polypro tops and bottoms to help fight off the cold. Some of this gear was issued to my while I was in the military, and some has been purchased out of pocket. The silk weight does very well to keep you warm and pull sweat off your body. The middle weight works very well at keeping heat in. I have figured out over the last two days that the silk goes on first a old t-shirt and then the middle weight. Then my showers pass rain jacket goes on. The combo on my top half works well. The only thing that I don't have that would make it nice are some very warm gloves.

The bottom half is another story. Because my body stays warm most of the time, I don't always get everything I should for the bottom half. So only having silk weight polypros and the castelli pioggia pants. My legs get a little cold. They are almost to cold. I know that we as cyclist have to watch what we are doing so as not to get to hot or to cold. So I am going to have to rethink what I am doing. I will also need look into some warmer foot wear.

Also over the last two days of riding I found out that my tail light which works great and I like very much does not like going over the frozen ground to much. I think that the jolting and bouncing around cause the light to much motion and the light turns it's self off. O the things we learn. The other thing that I have learned is that riding on the ice is a little easier then I thought. As I was going home last night and I rode across the ice and frozen snow I thought about how I would let my downhill bike float under me in a rock garden. So armed with that knowledge I relaxed my grip on the bars and had my legs take more of the work holding my weight, I rode home with out any problems.

Keep on spinning.

Thursday, December 4, 2008

To my flats

Holy crap, I have had more flats in the last two months. I am talking about 4 flat back tires and 1 front. The back tires have been little tiny shards of glass that you can't see and managed to find there way to the thinnest part of my tire. How they do this I am not sure. This last one to the front which happened on the first of this month was a tiny piece of steel or cable.

Then to make things better, the Kenda Kross Plus tires that I bought only 777 miles ago are breaking down faster then I thought. Well the back one is. So I go down stairs and set up the bike on the stand and get to changing that flat back tire only to notice that once the back tire is back one I see this huge bulge in the side wall. Thinking to myself this sucks. So I go over to my storage unit and get my last tire which is a Serfas Drifter. So this tire says that is has a FPS (flat protection system). Now back to the 1st of DEC and the flat front tire. As I am walking home because I am out of tubes and patches, I think to my self that I am tired of fixing flats. I head over to the Fred Meyer in my town, because the LBS is closed on Mondays. I go and get some tubes that have that slime junk in them. We will see if the FPS of the tire and the slime tires will give me longer breaks between tube changes.

Now with what three days under my belt on the new tubes and the new tire in the back. I am thinking that I want to go and get one more of these Serfas Drifters for the front. I must say that the tire rides smooth, and corners nice. It is crap in the mud that I ride through to get to the local bike trial. But I can say that the Kenda Kross Plus was no better in the mud and IT has some side lugs. I well see how things go after a week or some on the tubes and tire. Hopefully I am not ranting on about having to change yet another flat. Keep it greasy side down.

Monday, December 1, 2008

The rain gear arrives.

So I did something I am not totally proud of and bought some rain gear online instead of supporting my LBS (local bike shop). I try very hard to always go to the shops because I know from the company that I work for the net will kill little shops. The biggest problem that I faced was that I used the sites sizing chart only to get jacket that is to small. So one of three things happened. The chart is wrong or the jacket is labeled wrong or this company just makes clothes small. What ever the case, I was able to call them and send it in for an exchange. So no harm in the long run.

I was able to keep the pants and used them this morning on the way into work. I think they will work out great. I did not get to hot but I was not rained on. So I am not sure how well they until I get wet. I guess if I really needed to know if they work I could go stand in the shower with them on. I was a little surprised to see that most rain pants come with very little reflective surface, and black of all colors. I would have thought that they would have been more bright colors or more reflective piping, something. But "O" well, I can add more lights to my bike if I have to.

Once I get the jacket and I get to ride in the rain, I will post my thoughts on this gear. Keep spinning.