Hurricane Isaac landed yesterday in south Louisiana which means the folks to the west should not get much rain but wind is another matter. When I checked the weather at George Bush Intercontinental Airport before starting my ride today 16 mph wind from the north showed up. I left on the ride at 10:20 AM to a nice blue sky and 85 degrees. Humidity was acceptable at 55%. Once out the door I noticed the north wind felt stronger than 16 mph. As I rode through the houses to my exit route to US59 I could tell when I rode south the wind pushed me along nicely but whenever I turned into the wind I bogged down. The first 12.7 miles of the route went into the wind and my average speed for those miles was 13.7 mph and 14.0 mph. This did not look good to get my overall average speed up to 15 mph.
At Community Drive I turned west and the wind buffeted me from the right side but I could ride at a good speed. Prior to that sometimes when I checked the Garmin Edge 500 computer the speed showed 12.2 mph. When I finally got to ride south I changed to a lower gear to take advantage of the stiff tailwind. The recorded max speed is 22.8 but I saw 23.1 mph on the Garmin. Over the 28.47 mile route my average speed was 14.7 mph thanks to making up some of the lost speed. When I got home the IAH weather reported 20 mph wind with 25 mph gusts all from the north. The temperature increased to 93 degrees and the humidity was a dry 38%. No wonder I moved so slowly.
Other ride statistics:
- 1:55:51 riding time, 6:45 time stopped
- 75.3 RPM average cadence (hard to turn the pedals into the wind)
- 88.08 miles this week
- 712.72 miles for August
- 4647.68 miles YTD
- Link to RideWithGps.com map and metrics
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