I mixed the streets and direction on today’s ride on the “Atascocita – Walden – Huffman” route. Starting out I went on some different streets to get around Kingwood High School because of the 2:12 start time. I haven’t rode on these for over a year. On the east side of Lake Houston I went north on East Lake Houston Parkway to Smith Road and south on FM2100 to the Huffman Chevron. Normally I ride the other direction but today I took FM2100 south from FM1960 to Old Atascocita Road and then west and back to FM1960 on Fairlake Drive. Rarely do I ride this direction although most of the other bikers I see are going this direction. Everything looks different going the opposite way and being on the other side of the road I watched for surface irregularities.

The legs had difficulty whenever I was riding into the wind. I thought it was 6 mph or so but when I got home the weather showed 15 mph with 23 mph gusts. No wonder it took so much effort. This reverse route came to 32.19 miles with a 14.9 mph average speed. I did get the average speed up to 15.1 mph after riding west on FM1960 over Lake Houston with a nice tailwind. Two other bikers were out today along the route.

It was 84 degrees when I left home and 78 at the end. I decided to wear a long sleeve jersey just in case the wind was chilly; glad I did. Shorts were just right too.

Checking the mail at the end of the ride the new Continental Gartorskin Hardshell spare tire and tubes with 60mm stem arrived. Now I am prepared if I have a tire or tube problem. I did find out that a 700x23mm tire must be slightly smaller diameter than a 700x25mm. Inserting the 700×23 tire in the rear is much easier.

No biking on Thursday, taking my wife to the medical center. The weather forecast doesn’t look friendly for biking either: 89% chance of rain around noon, high of 68.

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