Miles to Date: 204.6 (203ish on-road; 1.6-ish off)
Miles on Hybrid: 14.28
Miles on Road Bike: The rest of them.
Off-Road Miles on Hybrid: 0
Steep, Off-Camber, Grassy Hill Climbs on Road Bike: 1
Planned Additional Mileage: 17 or 35 miles, depending.
Friendly Beeps: 1
Unfriendly Honks: 0
Future Permanent Cyclocross Course Sites Explored: 1
Rabbits seen: Many. It's a banner year for rabbits.
Urges to Say, "Bunnybunnybunny!" Supressed: 0
Dead Opossums Avoided: 4
Live Muskrats(?) Avoided: 1, 5 or 6 times
Dogs Who Totally Ignored Me!: 1
Cats Who Judged Me and Found Me Wanting: All of Them (except FuzzBat)
July has been ridiculously hot and humid, but in other ways has been a good month for me. I learned a lot of valuable lessons, and gained some very useful insights.
For example:
- I am not currently equipped to ride a century in extremely hot, humid weather, but I am nonetheless a little more heat-tolerant than I thought i was.
- No matter how much you love your precious road bike, it's good to 'mix it up' and ride different bikes. Really.
- Road bikes really do work pretty well off-road, though when you're riding over a bumpy field, you definitely want to relax your arms and get your fanny off the saddle, unless you don't like your fillings.
- Toe clips involve a significant learning curve.
- Too much diet soda still makes me hurt the next day ... aspartame bad :( (the solution, of course, is not to drink diet soda).
- I love Chicago.
- I am entirely comfortable in lycra shorts. In fact, it's possible that I'm entirely too comfortable in lycra shorts. I would wear my cycling shorts all the time, if it weren't for the fact that we have a dress code at work.
This morning was absolutely beautiful in comparison to the weather we've had lately — as I rolled out of the driveway (for the second time, after heading back to grab my gloves) the cool air actually startled me.
It made for a very nice ride in. I also had the good fortune of finding myself nicely in sync with both the traffic-sensing and timed stoplights for most of the way, though I did hit just every red light I could find in one small stretch near work. That annoyance, however, was mitigated by being able to cruise through the final 3 lights on my route, which almost always catch me.
On Southern Parkway, I spotted a pair of roadies riding together and waved (I am a firm proponent of the 'wave whenever possible' philosophy); one of them waved back (I don't think the other one saw me; he was looking somewhere else). That was nice. I also waved to other bikies out on the road — there were many this morning! — but oddly didn't get any waves back.
Normally it kind of works the other way — other roadies waving back is a toss-up, but 'reg'lar folks' on mountain bikes and hybrids are reliable wavers. Maybe they just hadn't had their coffee yet, though. I forget that not everyone is as disgustingly chipper in the morning as I am.
Tomorrow morning DD and I are planning on doing an LBC ride — 17 or 35 miles, depending how we feel. I didn't really realize until I was almost there that I had a goal of logging 200 miles this month, and since I've already hit that goal, tomorrow's ride is icing.
Though, really, every ride is icing.
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