Tuesday, November 11, 2008

Remembrance Ride

Have I got lots to learn about cold weather biking! I headed out around 10:00 am, the temperature was about -3 Celsius, it was cloudy with some wind. I was dressed in layers and had a headband on to protect my ears under my helmet. I even wore my poppy! About 20 minutes into my ride, my fingers felt cold, actually very cold, even though I had gloves on. So, of course, not the right gloves for biking. I do have biking gloves but they are fingerless. I thought these Isotoner gloves would work, but they didn't. I carried on biking, wiggling my fingers and especially my thumbs every now and then. Then I realized my feet were getting cold. I contemplated turning around and coming home but other than having cold hands and feet, I was really enjoying the ride. There are probably not very many more days that I can ride so I wanted to make the best of this one. I bit the dust and ended up having a three hour outting. By the time I got home my fingers felt numb and my feet were freezing. Cold weather biking is so different then cold weather running. It's probably time to put my bike in the basement until next spring!

6 comments:

  1. Good job. I really don't know the cure for cold hands on the bike. Not only is wind chill a factor, the cold bars penetrate through your palms to make it doubly uncomfortable.

    Run the bike as long as you can.

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  2. Nice job getting through the cold ride. Sounds painful, but worth it.

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  3. I would freeze at those temperatures... especially the hands and ears! Sounds like you coped ok though. Keep it up!

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  4. The cold hands while biking is a real problem. We had a real cold snap last year here and I got some heavy duty gloves for at an outdoor store because my cold hands were just so painful.

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  5. There is some pretty good gear that you can get to help. I've worn running gloves over my fingerless biking gloves and that helped. I also bought a pair of full length cycling gloves from Specialized that work fairly well.

    Also, if you are using bike shoes and clipless pedals I whole heartedly recommend getting shoe covers. Those things are amazing for keeping your toes warm!

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  6. I rode in -5°C this week and thought the same thing... OMFG I AM COMPLETELY FREEZING HERE! I couldn't feel my toes, my hands and my face... so yeah time to get a bike trainer!! I asked Santa to get me one LOL

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