Morning Ride – 20 April

Getting out of bed is rarely a problem for me in great part due to my caffeine addiction. I’m excited for that first cup and even more so today as I’m trying to cut down on how much I drink. By 4:40 this morning I had a bit of a headache and the room had cooled down overnight enough that the idea of having a hot cup of coffee sounded really good.

After coffee and a small snack, I came up against morning inertia. I probably could’ve managed to leave by 5:15 but as it turned out I didn’t get out the door until almost 5:40. I knew well enough that it was cold from the forecast but getting out into the -2°C weather that with the wind felt like -7° was a bit of a shock. But yay me! As it turns out, merino leggings, undershirt, windproof shell, shorts, jersey, wool socks, fleece headband and gloves turned out to be exactly right. I never got overheated, but I was also warm the entire time. That said, if I had gone another hour I’m pretty sure that even with the wool, my toes would have been really cold as they were just starting to feel cold when I arrived.

Half way through I started to see the sunrise. It was no “Sunrise across the pond” but it was still very pretty. I couldn’t stop long for a photo, though. It was cold and windy and I needed to keep pushing myself to generate heat.

In the past I’ve not taken my road bike on subzero days after we had rain or melt because of worries I might encounter ice. And in fact, I did encounter ice three times on bike paths. The good news is that they were all on relatively slow, straight stretches so there was minimal risk. All I needed to do was stay nice and still for the second or so it took me to cross and I would remain upright. I didn’t see ice on any of the main roads which is good because as you can see in the video, I approached 50km/hr at one point – not a great speed at which to wipe out. My fellow North American 70s kids will know that that would’ve meant “The Agony of Defeat”

Instead it was a beautiful ride that started in full darkness and ended in full daylight. 23.25 km in 1 hr 7 min. I may have been slow to get out the door but I did it, and had zero regrets.

And here’s the video – and lucky me to have found the GoPro setting that automatically keeps the shot level against the horizon. I had to manually straighten all of my clips in the last post.