Half way through September and 1/2 way to my goal of 10 rides this month!

This morning was AWESOME!! Fall is coming and a little chill is in the air. I started my ride this morning in the mid-50s under sunny skies. Beautiful day for riding.

One of the great things about riding is saying hello to people on my way to work. I probably average two to three hellos on each ride: nice lady watering her flowers in the early morning, kids walking to school or runners and walkers passing by. How many times while driving to work alone in your car do you get to look someone in the eye and say "good morning" AND get a friendly response?

Food for the soul my friends!!

Ride On!!

Plan the Path.

Before you are ready to start your bike commute, you have to spend plenty of time planning your route. For some, I suppose this could be very easy, if it's short and you are already on fairly safe and low traffic roads, but for many of us suburbanites, we travel roads that are not at all safe, or even legal, to ride on.

I realize that this is obvious - planning the route that is - but here are some tips that I recommend:

• when you first come up with a route, start with the safest possible route without consideration for extra distance travelled. Your goal is not SHORT, it's SAFETY!
• I started my route planning using the internet (Yahoo, Google Earth and Mapquest) and that is a good start to know what roads are out there. You will find several potential roads that you have never been on before that may run through neighborhoods and such.
• Once you have some general route ideas, go and drive them to work during normal rush hour times instead of your normal drive route. By just using the internet, you have no idea about some key things like:
  • traffic levels
  • width of road (two lanes in the same direction can be a good thing if not too much traffic, regardless, what is the width of any shoulder)
  • curbs (these limit your ability to ride closer to the edge of the road) 
  • sidewalks (can be illegal to ride on, but can in some cases provide some safety)
  • suitability of surface (is it gravel??)
  • lighting (especially if you may commute in the dark)
  • etc.
• Try riding some or all of the route on the weekend or other low traffic time to get a feel for what it is like to actually ride the route. It can be very deceiving when driving to imagine what it will be like to ride a bike on it.

I think those are the key things to remember. You cannot plan too much for a good route. The more comfortable you are with the route, the better and safer you will be.

I don't mind riding in the rain all that much, but today was a little too much rain for me. My added excuse is that not only do I get wet, but my backpack which carries my laptop computer and my work clothes is not exactly waterproof. Anyway, that's my excuse and I'm sticking to it!!

I may try to make it up tomorrow although Thursday is my swim day which makes cycling a bit tougher. We'll see.

I actually rode yesterday, but didn't have any time to blog it. I was back on my Yellow Trek 2300 since I got it out of the shop. Had to replace the cartride bearings on my Rolf Vector Comp wheels. It's riding as smooth as silk now!!

That's them (well not mine, I stole the picture off of someone's eBay sale)!! It's amazing to me how they can do with so few spokes, but they have been very durable.

Anyway, it was a good ride. In remembrance of 9/11, I tied a red, white and blue U.S. flag bandana to my backpack. I thought I might get some reaction or see others with flags on their cars, but frankly there was none of either. Oh well.

No watch on the ride again and it's a good thing. I hit all 3 major stoplights and probably lost a good 5 minutes in total just for that. No worries, I get plenty of a workout in between the lights!!

Ride On!!

Well, not really. I'm going to track my ride to Canada virtually! That is, I'll track my miles riding to work and then put it on the map. So far since the start of this blog, I've ridden approximately 104 miles (4 round trips at 26.2 miles each).

I'm starting in my home city of Atlanta and going north. So far, this puts me in Fair Play, SC!!

Fair Play, SC is just over the Georgia border and near Tugaloo State Park where my wife and I have both competed in triathlons.