On the commute today

[Si S]

Glorious morning and my legs are coming back 

[TimO]

I saw this cargo bike yesterday evening, passing the National History Museum as I left work around 8pm.

   

I think it's a Kemper Filibus

With the warmer weather, it's been several days since I saw anyone wearing a woolly hat or scarf.  Today is forecast to be the warmest day of the year, so far, and that point will be reached just as it's time to go home!

[clarion]

Last night, thanks to Satan opening a portal at Forest Hill to welcome Southern home to his realm, I got to ride from Cannon St to Balham.  It was kinda nice.

Train-biking again today.

[MagnusOpus]

Was bloody hot and sticky, even at 8am....I don't cope well with the heat, and recovering from flu, and feeling my first proper ride out since....so rolled in rather gently

going home is going to be a bit sweaty

[ian]

Gloriously hot. Though I find anything below 30 degrees cold. For bonus points, I fear I may be inclined to taking the Bactrian Leg Squeaker route home.

[Andrew Br]

Chilly enough for arm-warmers this am. No need for them in the pm.
Despite it being even earlier than audax o'clock, there were still a few joggers out and about.
I rode in along the "new" route via Didsbury and Cheadle but I decided to come home the "old" way- through Newall Green and down Styal Road to Sharston and Northenden where I nearly got taken out by a taxi. My advice to the driver may not have been the most polite.

I managed to get into the top 5 on a Strava segment along the banks of the Mersey (Lancashire side obv). I would have been even faster if I hadn't had to ease off to move a rubbing mud-guard. I'll try again on the next sunny day. I'm not sure that the burst of speed was adrenaline fuelled since I'd been going quite well before the "incident".

Late shift tomorrow so I'll definitely be riding and I'll be getting home around midnight. It gets a little bitty for the next few days: off Thursday, work Friday, off Saturday/Sunday, work Monday, off Tuesday/Wednesday. I don't think I'll get much leisure cycling done.

[CrinklyLion]

Tuesday school shuffled timings because of sports morning and the Year 6 water battle (and a dull meeting about a server) so I had a later start & finish than usual.

Took advantage of it to nip to another site to collect a belonging left behind last week, and went the long way, which turned my couple of miles to work into about 10.  Nice.

[pdm]

Warmish today. 22C going in, 32C coming home, lowest temp over Peaks was 30C. 2 pints of water required for trip home...

[Si S]

If these temperatures continue I'm going to have to start carrying a bidon, pretty dehydrated when I got home last night and still feeling not quite right this morning.

Got bitten by a nastyflyingthingywotsit down by the canal on the way in so my leg is heating and swelling up nicely, on the plus side just stepped through the door when the hail came hammering down.

[Jurek]

If you went cycling in a fan assisted oven, I think that'd feel like my journey home last night.
I've been carrying a bidon of water for the last two days - unheard of, for me.
Twice last night I poured its contents onto the cap I was wearing - to not very much avail.
I've also been leaving the house just after six, in order to get to work while most of the road is still in shade.
Its the journey home that I'm not looking forward to.

[ian]

Yes, last night was a long cycle into god's very own hair drier, though curiously I enjoyed it and it wasn't nearly as hard as it should have been. Partly the fact that I was on the skinny bike (fat bike is still broke, strangely difficult to get an axle, because no, I don't want a wheel or a sealed hub, just the bit it spins around, dear local bike shops) and partly that I'd eaten a lot of beans for lunch. And I suppose partly that I'd escaped a brand meeting unscathed. You can't catch me!

Then I got home two hours later and sweated. I mean an entire ocean came out of me. Fish. Mermaids. Captain Nemo. You name it. I have been replacing it ever since.

Sadly, on the train today because I need to arrive at a meeting in Stevenage not looking like I travel by sauna.

[Tim Hall]

I am a Cycling God.

(in reality there was the mother a tailwind this morning. And humid too. I fear thunder)

[Morrisette]

It was HOT last night. I did not like the strong southerly wind that strangely, the Met Office don't seem to know about.

I actually drank all my water, which never happens. And was still thirsty later. Where does it go?!

[Mr Larrington]

Non-availability of axles is nothing new, I had the same promble when my then-mighty thews snapped the rear axle of the Big Red Roockhooper circa 1988.

[Lady Cavendish]

Absolutely LOVING riding in this heat. I would take this all day every day.

Tonight, I was on my nice bike, it's pretty new and I love it. A guy came up to me, said it had taken a while to catch me and where was I headed. We were going to the same place- said he was doing about 20 miles to get there and did I want a tow. There was a headwind, and I'm lazy, so yes. About 22mph ok he says? Yeah.... happy to sit there and get a lift. It was a lovely ride, only problem was he had TOTALLY see through shorts on, so I had a full crack view for an hour.

[ian]

Non-availability of axles is nothing new, I had the same promble when my then-mighty thews snapped the rear axle of the Big Red Roockhooper circa 1988.

I have tried eight shops. I take the hint that I should get one online but I was too lazy to measure the one I've broken and thought I'd get away with asking someone knowledgable. I bodged a tape measure through the spokes to avoid getting oily and it says 170-something English millimetres.

That said, my commute seemed a lot faster on my skinny hybrid than my fat commutified BSO. I was a rocket. I even overtook someone going up Crystal Palace hill. That only usually happens if some calamity has resulted in them going backwards down the hill.

Roads were terrible, even at 11am. I guess everyone thought 'hot day, let's go sit in traffic and breath some fumes'. And not only that, a large number of them were so impressed by the weather that they felt the need to phone a friend as they stop-started through the badlands of South London just to tell them.

[Jurek]

I have 3 Top Peak pocket rocket pumps living permanently between the 4 courier bags I use.
Tonight I punctured.
Guess which bag I had?
Yup. The pumpless one.
Beaucoup merde!
Smiley, charming lady whom I encounter on a regular basis, on a nodding/smiling/saying hello basis rode past.
'Do you have a pump I could borrow, please?' I asked.
'I do but I'm not sure that it........' she answered.
'It's ok. I have a Brompton too. It won't'. Idiot.

Man with youngster on tagalong saved the day.
His Leyzene something-or-other saved me a ~£40.00+ cab fare (which my PA had arranged, and I  cancelled).
Youngster earned himself a £10.00 ice cream voucher, very reluctantly accepted by dad, for being patient and for asking key questions like 'Why doesn't this man have his own pump?'
This kid is the future.
Be pleased.
Serves me right for leaving work early this evening.
Any benefit of doing so went out the window thanks to puncture.

Pocket Rocket No.4 has been ordered from Evans for bag No. 4.
That ought to do it.

[Kim]

Smiley, charming lady whom I encounter on a regular basis, on a nodding/smiling/saying hello basis rode past.
'Do you have a pump I could borrow, please?' I asked.
'I do but I'm not sure that it........' she answered.
'It's ok. I have a Brompton too. It won't'. Idiot.

It will if you unscrew the end and reverse the thingy (wish I'd known this before stocking up on Brompton-size Schrader tubes).  In as much as the Brompton pump will do the job at all, that is - it runs on the sort of optimism that's best backed up with a couple of cans of CO2.

[Jurek]

Smiley, charming lady whom I encounter on a regular basis, on a nodding/smiling/saying hello basis rode past.
'Do you have a pump I could borrow, please?' I asked.
'I do but I'm not sure that it........' she answered.
'It's ok. I have a Brompton too. It won't'. Idiot.

It will if you unscrew the end and reverse the thingy (wish I'd known this before stocking up on Brompton-size Schrader tubes).  In as much as the Brompton pump will do the job at all, that is - it runs on the sort of optimism that's best backed up with a couple of cans of CO2.

Merci!
Knowledge of that could've got me home 20 minutes earlier.
I'm sure Smiley lady would've obliged.

[TimO]

Yesterday's "hair drier" ride was not repeated today, even though the temperature was at most only a couple of degrees cooler.  Leaving later meant that I was mostly in the shade, and that made it far cooler than the almost 100% toasting in the sun, of the previous day.

Like Si S, I was feeling pretty crummy yesterday, not carrying any sort of water with me, and downed two pints in fairly quick succession once I got home.  Today I smartly chilled a bottle, ready to take with me, and then promptly remembered it was still at home, when I was about halfway to work!

[Jurek]

Yesterday's "hair drier" ride was not repeated today, even though the temperature was at most only a couple of degrees cooler.  Leaving later meant that I was mostly in the shade, and that made it far cooler than the almost 100% toasting in the sun, of the previous day.

Like Si S, I was feeling pretty crummy yesterday, not carrying any sort of water with me, and downed two pints in fairly quick succession once I got home.  Today I smartly chilled a bottle, ready to take with me, and then promptly remembered it was still at home, when I was about halfway to work!

Mine is currently in the fridge.
I'm confident of remembering to pop it into the bottle cage tomorrow morning.

We'll see.....

[Andrew Br]

I'm either going well or there was a tail-wind in both directions today.
One thing that was very obvious is that i go better in the afternoon/evening than I do in the mornings.
I'd previously come to the conclusion that I can do 18mph along a flat road on the Dirty Disco at the sort of effort that I could keep up for hours. On the morning commutes over the past few weeks, 15mph wasn't easy. This pm, I was back to 18mph again (both ways too).
It was a nice temperature going in although I started sweating whenever I had to stop. I thought I was going to get soaked on the way home but, thankfully, only a few drops of rain fell.

In the next few weeks, I'm going to give the Rohloff bike another try. If it is as joyless to ride as I remember, I'll be getting rid.

[Si S]

Another lovely morning, still a bit fatigued though, took a lot to hold the gap to a guy on a ribble with cosmic carbones on through Cadishead although I did manage to close right up on the rise past the railway station.

[clarion]

I am more commuting with a bicycle than by bicycle at the moment.  But it still feels better than not.

[fuzzy]

On yesterdays ride home, I was assaulted by a tree.

There is a low hanging branch, about the thickness of my leg, across a trail I use when partaking in comedy off roading, low enough to occasionaly skim the top of my helmet as I pass below. Yesterday afternoon, as I ducked below the preceding light foliage, some bastard workmen fired up a compressor off to my left and close by. This caused me to be distracted which caused me to sit up slightly- 4 inches up to be precise. Cue BANG! stars, snapping together of teef, whiplash, confusion and a stopping of forward motion while I tried to remember what I was up to.

Helmet has a tidy dent in it at the front just above the peak and the ibuprofen is working on the neck pain. Bike is completely uninterested in what happened.