I took two days off because of rain on Saturday and Sunday. Sunday evening the wind picked up from the northwest which means some cooler weather moves into the area. This morning when I check my home weather station shortly after 7 AM I saw 62 degrees, about 5 degrees higher than the weather forecast. While I waited for the temperature to go up some I ran some errands. By the time I got finished around 10:30 the temperature rose to 73. The clear blue sky beckoned me to ride even with the 16 mph northwest wind.

I donned a short sleeve jersey and bike shorts to get started at 11:40 but when I walked to the garage for my bike I squeezed the rear tire and di not get the response I wanted; it was soft. I took the wheel off and went out into the sun to look for the culprit but none appeared. Not wanting to lose more time I switched out the Mavic rims for the Bontrager rims, aired up the tires and took off. I don’t ride on the  Bontrager rims very often so I was surprised that the rear cassette start skipping in the third, fourth and fifth gears. Once I got up to sixth gear the skipping stopped so I pedaled much smoother. The Bontrager gearing is lower than the Mavic setup so getting to the same speeds meant that I must use the 9th and 10th cogs. Going into the wind as I rode north kept me going slow until I turned east on FM1314 at Porter. This put with the wind until I turned north on Loop 494. The buildings and trees broke the wind enough that I could speed up some.

When I got to New Caney and turned west on FM1485 for the short distance to US59 I hit the wind straight on. When I turned south on US59 the wind almost became a tailwind and I picked up my speed some. Over the 31.19 mile route I averaged 15.8 mph with a 23.1 mph top speed and 82.9 RPM average cadence. Now that I headed back home the wind mostly came from my back or right rear quarter. Going into Valley Ranch presented a challenge with a headwind for almost a mile but I started going south again and held my speed. I got back home at 1:54 PM with 1:58:46 riding time and 5:28 time stopped.

After eating lunch I examined the rear wheel and found another hole in the tube. I patched the tube, aired up the tire and now I wait to see if the repair fixed the problem. I could not find the cause of the leak though.

Links to Garmin Connect and RideWithGPS.com maps and metrics.

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