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Archives for December 2011

What’s Black and White and Blocks Wind All Over?

12.06.2011 by Ray Niekamp // 6 Comments

After that no-ride weekend, I was looking forward to getting back on the bike. But being an adopted Texan, I have also become a weather wuss. My friends in Minnesota would be mortified that we tend to avoid riding in what to them seem like mild temperatures. But so it goes.

However, driving home from work today, I resolved that I would get out on the bike regardless of the cold. The dashboard thermostat read 39 degrees (4C), and there was a brisk wind blowing from the northwest. But the sun shone brightly, and by almost any standard, it was a beautiful day.

When I told my wife I intended to ride, she said she’d been bent over her computer keyboard all day, and was up for a ride, too. We started getting into our selection of cold-weather riding gear.

I pulled on a short-sleeved base layer and my long-sleeved jersey with brushed insides. Over that, my windbreaker. This has worked in 40-degree weather in the past, but not in the kind of wind we had today. I decided to rely on a time-honored method bikers use to block the wind: the newspaper.

Fabian Cancellara stuffs a newspaper in his jersey just before starting a descent in this year's Tour de France.

I grabbed a thin section from the morning’s paper that was still lying on our kitchen table, folded it over once, and jammed it down the inside of my jersey. The tight-fitting fabric seemed like it would do a good job of keeping the paper in place over my upper torso.

Pat put on the long-sleeved jersey I got her last month for her birthday. It’s a warmer garment than mine, and the panels over the chest are made of a nylon wind-blocking material. Over that, she layered an old fleece pullover.

We fished out our wool socks, put the toe covers on our shoes, and dug the full-fingered gloves out of the bike stuff box.

“Whoa!” Pat yelled, as we pulled out of our driveway. “Have a little cold!”

At the first stoplight a mile into the ride, we caught up to another cyclist. Pat and he chatted a bit as we all climbed a long gentle hill, and then he passed me and took off.

“He wasn’t going to let an old woman on a hybrid stay even with him,” Pat laughed. “But he did say he thought this was the nicest biking weather of the year. He must be from the Midwest.”

On the way back, we were dead into the wind. Aside from making my eyes tear, which I hate when I’m building speed on downhills, it didn’t have any effect on what I was wearing. The layer of newspaper was doing its job.

While waiting at a red light, though, Pat complained that her tights weren’t thick enough to protect her thighs. They were cold, and that made the arthritis in her hip flare up. She soldiered through the discomfort and we got home before the sun set.

Inside, I dug the newspaper out from my jersey. It was a bit damp, but not wet. It had done its job of blocking the wind nicely, although by the time we finished the ride, it had slipped lower on my chest and shifted over to the side a bit. Still, a successful experiment.

Closed cell foam is often used by campers as sleeping pads.

Our club president has his own variation on the newspaper as wind blocker: bubble wrap. Well, that’s what he calls it, but it’s really a thin layer of closed-cell foam. He cuts generous squares off a roll and fits them over his torso under his jersey. He likes to tell the rest of us on our Sunday club rides how comfortable he is in cold and windy weather. I used to pooh-pooh his foam trick, but after my experience with the newspaper I think he might be on to something.

Have you ever resorted to newspapers or foam or something else to keep you comfortable on a ride?

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Categories // Accessories, Cold weather Tags // wind, winter riding

The Lost Weekend

12.04.2011 by Ray Niekamp // 8 Comments

It started raining Thursday night, then continued on and off on Friday. By the time I headed home late Friday afternoon, the rain was heavier. I wouldn’t get a chance to take my Friday after-work ride this time around.

On Saturday, the rain fell harder. My wife and I were delighted. This is just the kind of rain we’ve been hoping for here for over a year. The extraordinary drought Texas finds itself dealing with has led to water use restrictions throughout the state. Some small municipalities are in danger of losing their local water supplies. So the rain is really a good thing.

It kept falling Saturday afternoon, and seemed to gain intensity.

“Can we sneak in a short ride?” asked my wife. She’d been working at her home-based business all morning, and needed a break.

“No, it’s still coming down,” I replied. Any riding was out of the question.

Neither of us like riding in the rain. Pat simply won’t do it. I will start a ride in iffy weather and hope the rain holds off, but if it falls while I’m out there, so be it. I’ll deal with it. However, I always bear in mind that the last serious crash I had was during a rainfall. So if it looks like I could get caught in the rain during a ride, I’ll just stay inside.

Saturday night, we were at a party hosted by some members of my bike club. Although it was a holiday party, much of the chatter was about bikes and biking. No one was enthusiastic about riding Sunday morning, except, of course, our club president.

“You’re coming out, aren’t you?” he asked me.

“No, I’ll give it a pass,” I said.

“You must have a beater bike you wouldn’t mind getting wet,” he said. “I’ll be out there on my rain bike.”

“Have fun,” I told him. It looked like he would be the only one riding Sunday morning — if he decided to follow through on his pledge.

If anything, the rain fell harder on Sunday morning. It was 48 degrees when I woke up (about 9C) and the forecast said the temperature would fall along with the rain all day. I visited my bike in the garage and changed the batteries in the headlight.

So here I am Sunday evening, and the rain is spottier than it’s been all weekend, but there’s still a chance we’ll get some more before midnight. And a good chance for more rain Monday. As far as putting any miles on my bike are concerned, I’ve lost the chance to do that this weekend. Too bad. I managed to sneak in over 300 miles in November, and wanted to get a good start on December to do at least that many.

But there’s a silver lining. We’re at the end of the fall semester, and I’ll have some time on my hands during the week in just a few more days. So I guess I’ll accept the lack of riding this weekend, knowing that our grass might green up again and that I’ll be getting in some miles later this week. When you’re as used as I am to riding in decent conditions pretty much year around, a weekend off is tough to take.

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Categories // Odds 'n ends Tags // rain

The Hidden Danger of Bike Lanes

12.01.2011 by Ray Niekamp // 4 Comments

Normally, I’m a fan of bike lanes. In my area, which is a subrban-style neighborhood, they’ve been striped on most of the arterials. It’s reassuring for me to know that if I stay in my lane and the cars stay in their lane, we can all just get along.

That rose-colored glasses view of bike lanes fogged over last weekend when I was on a short ride with my wife. We do a nine-mile round trip from the house. It takes only about 40 minutes, but she considers it a good ride, and it’s often the only ride I’m going to get anyway, so I’m happy to do it. We ride the bike lane along a broad, two-lane street out to a busy highway, then turn around and double back.

I like to crank it up on the way back. There’s a nice stretch of almost two miles that’s a little bit downhill, and it’s easy to build up some decent speed. I’ll usually charge through there and then stop to wait for Pat at the last side street before we have to make a left turn at a stoplight and head home.

So I was moving at a pretty good clip, approaching a side street that entered from the right. Without warning, a white Toyota Camry sped up to the intersection. The driver was looking to his right. I was coming from his left. Instead of stopping even with his stop sign, he kept coming until the nose of his car was sticking out into the bike lane — just as I got there.

I flicked the handlebars over and passed in front of him. He didn’t see me until I was right on top of him. The whole thing happened so quickly, I didn’t even have time to yell, “On your left!” or some such thing.

The situation could have been very dangerous. Well, it was, but it could have had serious consequences. When I moved to my left to avoid him, I darted into the traffic lane — without looking. I had no idea if a car was behind me in that lane or not. (I had a pretty good idea none was, since I had not heard anything. But with today’s quiet cars, you never know.)

As I continued riding, I thought about the close call. I was still thinking about it about a half mile down the road when sure enough, another car — this time a black Mercedes driven by a soccer mom type — enters the intersection from the right, and doesn’t stop until it’s completely blocking the bike lane. This time, I wasn’t quite as close as in the first incident, so my move into the traffic lane was done more deliberately, and I even signaled my move –but I still didn’t look for cars coming up behind me.

Now, I suppose I could make the argument that I should always just take the lane anyway and not both about bike lanes. But I don’t think that’s necessary. I prefer to maintain an entente cordiale with motorists, and in four years of riding along that street, I really haven’t had much to complain about. But an entente implies that two parties are involved, and I’d sure like to see drivers acknowledge that marked bike lanes are another traffic control feature that must be observed, just like yield signs and double yellow lines.

In the meantime, I’ll be riding that route with a heightened sense of alertness.

Bike lane picture from University of South Florida Bike Club.

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Categories // Safety Tags // bike lanes

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