As I got ready to leave while I ate an apple and other snack I reviewed possible routes for today’s ride. Yesterday I planned on riding east today but I thought maybe I should go north. In the end I stuck with my plan and rode the “FM1960 to FM686 – Back Extended” route. Bad choice it turns out. More on this shortly.

Rolling out the driveway at 11:59 the weather was gorgeous. Low 80’s with a few small clouds dotting the blue sky and a SE 9 mph wind waited for me as I rode to Atascocita and beyond. I saw another bike rider before I got to FM1960 and later another lady biker passed on Fairlake Drive.

The ride was going great until I got to 22.25 miles when I heard something hit my rear wheel and made a noise each time the wheel turned. I quickly stopped and checked the front wheel just in case I heard wrong. Looking at the rear wheel the problem was quick to find. A bright sliver piece of metal stuck out of the tire about 10 inched from the valve. I was on FM1960 with traffic buzzing and I decided to walk to Huffman – Eastgate Road where it wasn’t so busy and noisy. It was about 2/10ths of mile and I picked a spot and began working on the tire. I pulled what looked like a nail out and it was longer than I expected, about 1 1/4″. Next I got the tire tools out and removed one side of the tire and pulled the tube out. The hole was easy to spot. Roughing up the tube with sandpaper I applied glue, waited for it to dry and put a patch on it. The patch looked like it glued on perfectly. I put the tube back in the tire, mounted the tire and began pumping it up. The tire started to air up but would not get hard enough to ride. I pumped it up again and still not firm. I unscrewed the pump hose (I use a Lezyne pump) and reconnected it thinking maybe I didn’t have it tight enough. I did this a couple of times without success airing up the tire. Unscrewing the hose a silver part came out of the tire valve and I thought the tube was ruined and the valve stem broke off. Without thinking I unscrewed the part from the pump hose and threw in the grass. After a couple of minutes when I removed the tube from the tire it dawned on me what I saw was the Presta valve core and now I had to use the spare tube in the seat bag. I installed it in the tire, mounted the tire and pumped it up. When I unscrewed the pump hose a big whoosh of air came out of the tire. The valve stem was in the in of the pump hose. I removed it from the hose, screwed it into the valve stem and tried again. Same result. I tired again and the valve core kept coming unscrewed. The valve core has two flat sides to allow a wrench to tighten it. My problem: no wrench. I tired using two Allen keys squeezing the core to tighten it and that helped some but it came unscrewed again. Next I thought the hose end sticking to the core and poured some water into the hose end. Screwing it on the tire valve I did not tighten it as much as before and pumped up the tire. This time I slowly unscrewed it and the core stayed in the valve stem. Success!!! If that had not worked I was going to call my wife to rescue me. Now I had to decide whether to continue riding the route or turn back. I decided to continue riding east on the route. While I was working on the tire several people stopped to ask if I was okay or needed help. I told them I was doing okay but if they had come by near the end of the ordeal I might have answered differently. UPDATE: Turns out the reason the patch did not work is I missed a second hole at the edge of the patch. I found this at home after removing the original patch and putting on a new one. When I aired up the tube I could feel and hear the air escaping. I haven’t had much success putting a patch on another patch. I retired the tube and put a new one in my seat bag. UPDATE #2: I peeled the small patch off the leaking original tube and put a larger one on. Pumping up the tube with the floor pump the tube appears to be fixed. I put it back in my seat bag for the next major flat.

Rolling back to FM1960 to cross to the east bound shoulder every car in this part of Liberty and Harris Counties came by. After several minutes a break in the traffic arrived and I rode to the othe side and headed east. As I was riding I started thinking about the probability of riding over a nail in an 8 foot wide shoulder. I figured it was pretty small but I did it. Some of the numbers: 8 ft. wide shoulder = 96″. Take away 2 feet on each side of the shoulder where the most debris is and the rumble grooves leaves 48″. The nail was maybe an 1/8″ in diameter, the tire was 23mm wide or 7/8″ wide. Dividing 48″ by 7/8″ gives 64 strips 7/8″ wide in the remaining 48″ wide shoulder. So the probability is 1 in 64. I didn’t do all this math while I was riding but I thought about it. Now that I cleaned this small portion along FM1960 east the next biker has a lower probability of getting a flat. Maybe my formula needs to use the width of the nail. In that case the probability is 1 in 384. Even less likely to happen.

Riding past the Dayton Food & Fuel Store at FM686 I turned around to ride west and the traffic starting passing by again. I think they were waiting for me to try to cross FM1960. I stopped at the Dayton Food & Fuel store, washed my hands from the tire repair and refilled my water bottle. Walking outside I drank some water and got a “brain freeze” from the ice cold water which took several minutes to leave. Recovered I got on the bike and rode west back to Huffman where Is topped at the Chevron station for a real break. The Edge 520 screen when I got to the station.

I sat in the shade to eat 2 granola bars and drink 32 oz. of Powerade. Leaning against the gas pump canopy support pole I felt my back muscles. Most of the tire repair action was me standing up bending over the rear tire and my back was sore now. I stayed there for about 40 minutes. The shade was cool and the breeze dried up what little perspiration I had. The weather while I was at the Chevron station.

My back felt better after resting and eating. I got back on the bike and headed for home. Riding west on FM1960 and through Atascocita Shores I started getting “phone disconnected” messages from the Edge 520. I had a couple earlier in the ride but they reconnected. Now the disconnect message came but no reconnect messages appeared. The 520 still recorded the ride data so I wasn’t too concerned. When I stopped at our mailbox and stopped the 520 I waited for it to save and upload the ride. The save part happened but the upload didn’t. Also the LiveTrack kept going when it is supposed to stop when the end ride button is pressed. After leaning the bike against the fence I turned the power off on my phone planning on starting it up to see if this allowed the upload to happen. When I checked the 520 on the bike it was froze on the power off screen. Apparently turning the phone off caused that. I pressed the 2 buttons to restart the 520 and it went through its steps. It connected to my phone and not long after that the ride data uploaded to Garmin Connect. I also noticed the speed showing on the 520 would jump wildly with the new speed sensor. I would look and the speed would be 20+ mph and then drop to 9 mph. I thought maybe the battery was low but when I checked the battery in the 520’s settings it said it was okay. Not sure what is going on. Overall the speed data looks okay. Oh how great technology is!!!

In the garage I got an old tube and removed the valve core from it and screwed it in the tube I brought back with me. Testing the pump hose on it the core unscrewed again. I put some oil in the end of the hose and that seems to fix the problem. The core stays in. Now all I have to do is patch the tube again. Pumping it up with the floor pump the air comes out around the patch. I don’t know I missed the hole or the glue/patch was no good. I will try another brand of patch kit, Park Tools I think is what I have.

The good weather holds for Sunday but I will probably ride a short ride because it is Mother’s Day.

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