Last night when I went to the garage to take out the trash I squeezed the front tire of my Stradalli and the tire felt a tiny bit soft. I had aired up the tires a few days ago so the pressure should have still been hard. This morning I went out to check the tire again and it felt softer. After breakfast I took the tire off the bike and pulled the tube out for a leak check. After passing the tube through water the only bubble I found was at the valve stem where the Presta core screws in. I tighten the core about a quarter turn, put the tube back in the tire and aired it up. After today’s bike ride on the “New Caney – Roman Forest – Valley Ranch” route the front tire still feels hard to the squeeze; maybe the quarter turn fixed the slow leak.

Today’s bike ride totaled 39.39 miles moving the week to 125.71 miles and April to 380.19 miles (49% of my 772 mile goal). I am a few miles ahead of schedule for both the April goal and year goal.

The weather was good for biking: 83 degrees at the finish (home weather station), mostly cloudy sky which made it a little chilly when the sun was behind the clouds with the strong wind. My home weather station has a problem measuring the wind due to the houses and trees so I rely on the airport weather for a better idea of the wind. Today the airport wind showed from the SE at 16 mph with 22 mph gusts. I could tell the wind was strong but I didn’t realize it was that strong until I took the screenshot at the end of the ride (2:43 pm). I could’ve worn a long sleeve jersey and been comfortable but I opted for short sleeves. The bugs must be coming out now that it has warmed up and rained some. Sunscreen on my arms was tacky enough for some of the bugs to stick when I rode into them. Flying ants and a few “love bugs” got a bike ride whether they wanted it or not.

Other than tacky bugs and the strong wind nothing unusual happened on the bike ride. I stopped at the Stripes on FM 1314 for a short rest after fighting the wind from Roman Forest Blvd. I refilled my water bottle and ate a trail mix bar I brought.

About a mile from on a street I biked many times a small dog darted out of a driveway barking in hot pursuit of me but I easily rode away leaving him it the middle of the street. I never saw this dog before.

I am still getting used to the PowerPod figuring out how to change my riding to improve my power. Maybe the 3 second moving average is better to watch than the real time number that jumps around a lot.

Saturday’s weather looks good for a bike ride and maybe I can start a little earlier than today’s 11:40 am start.

Link to today’s ride on Strava.com and RideWithGPS.com.

Golden Cheetah ride summary

Strava extended statistics

Today’s weather: home weather at the start, home weather at the end and airport weather at the finish