After much delay I was back biking today. Between the rainy and chilly weather and recovering from my surgery today is my second ride of the year. I wanted to get several more rides. Now the weather looks like it will turn wintery on me starting tomorrow and continuing until maybe Sunday. Today’s weather was almost perfect with a clear sky, 71 degrees and a stout 13 mph wind from the SSW, gusts were up to 21 mph. Yesterday it only got up to 56 degrees. After the deluge of rain on Monday the trails were water covered in several places. Fortunately my area of Houston did not get as much rain as the southeast side.

I decided today I would ride my mountain bike due to my surgery scar still is stiff and moving my left forearm is not as fluid as normal. The goal was to ride more than 15 miles which I did ending up at 20.44 miles. I overdressed so at about the 3 mile mark I took off my leg warmers. I still wore my long sleeve jersey and windbreaker becuase the wind was a little chilly in the trees on the trails. When I stopped to remove the leg warmers I snapped this picture with my phone.

Motobecane 700HT MTB amongst the cut trees

The bike is leaning against a tree cut down for either the drought or the pine bark beetles. They are still cutting trees down. There were a couple of places where the tree cutters had the trails closed for work.

My average speed was not that great at 11.5 mph. I thought this would be higher as I was biking but the time spent going into the wind must have slowed me down more than I realized. Max speed was 20.4 mph and my average cadence was 74.9 RPM. My left arm is not as free to pull on the bars as my right so this could play a part. My year to date mileage is now up to 37.07 miles. I need to be pushing the pedals to get to my usual 200 miles for January.

Link to my ride at Garmin Connect.  Link to my ride at RideWithgps.com.

1-11-2012 Bike Ride Data and Route Map

1-11-2012 Home Weather Station End