The temperature went up and down a couple of degrees this morning as I waited to start the bike ride. It wasn’t enough to keep me from biking but I made a outfit change after it settled at 65 degrees to half finger gloves. The overcast sky didn’t help my hurrying get outside either. I got everything together, mostly me, wheeled my Canyon Endurace out the door and pushed the start button on my Bolt computer at 12:33 PM, about an hour later than I wanted.
I knew I wanted to ride but went back and forth on which route to ride. With the later start I decided on my “Kingwood – FM 1485 – Kingwood” route. I didn’t know the wind conditions when I made the choice but it worked out that the SE wind helped me to FM 1485, mostly. Today’s bike ride covered 31.66 miles, catching me up with a small cushion for my mileage goal for February. I am at 135.6 miles compared to 114.28 miles if I averaged 14.3 miles for 8 days. I am 18 miles ahead of last year on this date. I did twice as much climbing yesterday while Zwifting compared to 75 feet today.
Being a weather wimp I loaded on the clothing: shorts, leg warmers, long sleeve thermal jersey, and a windbreaker jacket. It seemed like it took longer for me to warm up after starting but it was about 15 minutes into the ride which is normal with chilly weather. The weather conditions: start 65 (74% humidity, 56.9 dew point), overcast, wind SE 18 mph gusts 24 mph; finish 66 (77% humidity, 58.6 dew point), overcast, wind SE 12 mph. Thank goodness by the time I made the u-turn under US59 just north of FM 1485 the wind calmed down some. fighting 24 mph gusts for 17 miles is not fun. The next two days should be warmer but not less overcast before a strong cold front moves in sometime Thursday.
Looking at the bike ride summary data from Golden Cheetah, 46% of the 2:16:46 moving time I was in power zones 1 and 2. Zones 3 through 7 comprised the remaining 54%. Average power was 112 watts with a max of 460 watts. Strava’s assessment of the bike ride, “This was consistent with your usual efforts.” Average speed maxed at 14.4 mph while I rode south through Valley Ranch and Oakhurst. This shows up in the video when I show my computer screen.
