The big news on today’s bike ride: wind and light rain. The weather forecast went light on the chance of rain during the day so I set off on today’s bike ride following my “Atascocita – Walden – Huffman” route. I should have earlier than the noon start time and maybe missed some of the light rain that I ran into east of Lake Houston on Old Atascocita Road. From that point until I finished around 2:25 PM I biked through patches of light rain but at Alspaugh’s Hardware the rain got serious while I waited to cross W. Lake Houston Parkway.

Maybe the trade off for a day in the low 70’s in January includes overcast sky and some light rain. Weather at the start and finish: start 73 (78% humidity, 65.9 dew point), overcast, wind S 16 mph gusts 25 mph. Finish 71 (86% humidity, 66.8 dew point), light rain, wind S 14 mph gusts 25 mph. I did not realize how strong the wind was until I took screenshots of the NOAA current conditions just before starting the bike ride. It was tough riding whenever I headed south. My power readings on the Elemnt computer spiked above 600 watts a couple of times pedaling into the wind. That surprised me because I rarely get above 500 watts. Possibly a contributing factor for the high power reading was the new mounting for my PowerPod and GoPro camera.

Until today I mounted the PowerPod below and in front of the handlebars. The GoPro stood on the handlebars in the center (see the first picture). I bought a mount extender on eBay that holds two GoPro type items side-by-side out front of the bike below my Elemnt computer. The PowerPod position might influence the power measurement but I am not sure. One thing I learned during the bike ride: the GoPro camera should be on the left making it easier to push the start/stop button to record. The GoPro has no problem recording upside down but the microphone is farther away from me. After the ride I moved the camera to the left. Next bike ride will tell me if it is easier to get to the start/stop button. Maybe it will improve the audio too. The GoPro White Hero7 does not accept a microphone. I would to move to a Hero 8 camera for that.

Rain and overcast sky awaits on Friday. According to the forecast the rain chance gets higher in the evening. I plan on biking before then.