I think of today’s ride as a recovery from the Spindletop Spin on yesterday. I was thinking of a route to Huffman and decided to ride the one that is there and back. I used to ride this route in the evenings when I still worked and the distance fit into the daylight window during the summer. The distance today was 25.91 miles at a 14.5 mph average speed. I was not pressing the speed but I did need to get back home before 2:00 which I did (1:42). I saw three other cyclists; one on Woodbridge Drive, one over Lake Houston on FM1960 and one on Atascocita Shores Drive.

As I crossed over FM1960 going towards Walden I hit a bump and the rear tire felt like it was flat. I stopped to check but the tire was at full pressure. Riding on the same thing happened again and I pulled over. I checked the front wheel quick release and tightened it some. This didn’t fix the problem and I stopped again. This time I checked the rear wheel and it was loose in the dropouts. Apparently when I took the bike out of the Jeep GC when I got back from Beaumont I did not set the axle completely in the dropouts and tighten the quick release enough. Adjusting the quick release fixed the problem and I went on to Huffman. I don’t remember having this problem before.

When I got to the Huffman Chevron I refilled my water bottle, took a screen shot of the weather on my phone and got ready to head back home. I looked at the clouds and they seemed to be getting darker to the south over Crosby. Maybe I would be racing the rain on the way home. Nothing happened to cause concern until I approached E. Lake Houston Parkway on FM1960 and a few small drops hit me. These didn’t last but not too much longer when I was on the causeway rain drops came down occasionally. Once I was off the causeway and turned onto Atascocita Shores Drive the rain stopped. As I rode into Kingwood I noticed the sky was darker to the east and as I got closer to home I felt some more rain. When I turned onto Park Garden the rain started coming stronger but I rode through it onto dry streets. I made it home without any more rain but after I was inside the rain started up again. I missed getting soaked and gritty.

It looked like the ride would be hot. I left home at 1:45 with 90 degrees but thanks to the rain clouds it dropped down to 88 when I finished at 1:42. Up to arriving in Huffman the sky was mostly cloudy but after that the sun did shine through much. Humidity stayed around 50%.

Mileage statistics:

• 253.62 miles this week
• 282.74 miles in June (602 miles to reach 885 mile goal)
• 2682 miles year to date

[iframe http://connect.garmin.com/modern/activity/516524702 97% 900px]

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