A Break in the Weather Allows Bike Ride
February is off to a better start than January. My first ride in January was the 6th so I got an earlier start this month.
The weather forecast had rain but when I got home from church it was trying to be sunny and the temperature was 77 or 78. The clouds were thick in places but not enough to delivery any rain. I rolled out the drive way at 11:45 on the way to Huffman. I expected to ride about 30 miles and ended up riding 30.15 miles. It didn’t take too long to meet another biker on Tree Lane about 2 miles from my house. Our paths went different ways though. Earlier on Woodbridge Drive two bikers were going north while headed south. The last biker I saw was on Fairlake Drive.
I dressed somewhat lightly with shorts and a long sleeve jersey leaving the jacket at home. Most of the time I was comfortable but riding over Lake Houston the wind picked up the coolness from the water and I was glad the body heat from riding was just enough to keep me kinda comfortable.
At the beginning the wind was 13 mph was the SW but as the ride went along I thought it was stronger than that. When I got home my suspicions were correct with a 12 mph WSW wind with 21 mph gusts. Those gusts helped me riding east over Lake Houston on FM1960 but coming back it was like riding with a weight tied to me. Going east I rode at 22 mph and returning home it was 11 to 12 mph. The west bound traffic didn’t help much to block the wind. I thought I was going to be able to ride at 15 mph as I left the Huffman Chevron but by the time I got to Lake Houston I couldn’t keep that speed up.
Clouds were starting to get heavier during the ride home and the sun left leaving body heat to offset the wind chill.
I am still short of 200 miles for the year with 171.66 so far. The weather forecast does not bode well Monday through Friday with temperatures below 60 and some rain. When will this weather give me a break?
Links to Garmin Connect and RideWithGPS.
