Warm = More

We’ve had an exceptionally warm start to the year. I have been able to ride outside a lot more than last year when biking was waylayed by a February snow storm. (My wovel sits unused this winter.)

In Februrary I rode The Mule, my Specialized Sequoia touring bike, to work 14 times for a total of 417 miles. My weekend ride was Deets, my Surly Cross Check. I rode 242 1/2 miles on weekends, 240 on the Cross Check and only 2 1/5 on The Mule. Little Nellie remains in dry dock and Big Nellie remains in the basement. (Anyone want to buy a pre-owned long wheel base recumbent? Accepting offers in the Comments section below.)

So far this year I have commted by bike 27 times, 2 more than last year. My total miles stands at 1,323 1/2 (although 92 miles were on Big Nellie in the basement during an icy spell in January.) That’s 420 more miles than last year which had an extra day.

The Mule is eating up the pavement at 807 1/2 miles. Deets is way behind at 424 miles. In a couple of weeks, The Mule will hit a mileage milestone and be moved to the shed for some R&R. It has completed its winter service with nary a complaint.

Ironically, today I drove to work so I can attend the WABA annual meeting and awards event in the city. Riding home at 9 pm on a Tuesday no longer agrees with my old bones. I am already packed for tomorrow’s bike commute. March comes in like a Mule around here.

January Goes Out Like a Chocolate Bobcat

January was certainly an eventful month. Normally it involves snow and ice and days off the bike. Instead we got only one week of cold weather. The average temperature was 6 degrees above normal. This means of course that February is going to suck. Take it to the bank.

I rode 664 miles during January. Possibly my biggest January ever. 92 miles were actually on Big Nellie in the basement when the roads were too icy to ride on. (I calculate these miles based on 12 miles per hour not actual distance.) I did 184 miles on Deets on the weekends and holidays. The remaining 388 miles were from 13 bike commutes on The Mule.

Last January we had a big snow storm called Snowzilla. I didn’t have a bike in the basement so I missed out on an entire week of riding. Of course, I shoveled a shit ton of snow last year but that doesn’t show up on the odometer. I only rode 446 miles with 10 commutes totaling 301 miles. So I am 118 miles ahead of last year’s pace.

So what does this have to do with chocolate and bobcats?

Today, slightly less than seven months before I retire, I learned that the soulless neighborhood in which I work is going to be headquarters of Nestles chocolate company. I wonder if you get free Crunch bars if you work there.

Also, at the end of January a bobcat escaped from the National Zoo in DC. On my ride home today I heard the strangest screech from across the parkway. Could it be a bobcat? Nope. They found the bobcat on the zoo grounds late today.

So if it wasn’t a bobcat, what was it?

February begins with a mystery….

June Lite

I somehow managed to salvage a respectable amount of riding in June. I rode 594 miles, 78 percent of which was riding 16 times to and from work (and the car garage and Nats games). 131 miles were from weekend rides, all but 1 1/2 miles of which was on my Cross Check. I commuted to work three times on Big Nellie. Most of my rides were intentionally on upright bikes, to prepare for the July tour of Wisconsin and Michigan.

For the first half of the year I rode 3,371 miles. 2,517 came from 85 bike commutes. My oldest bikes still get the most work. I’ve ridden The Mule 1,216 miles. Big Nellie had 923 miles.

I also hiked up Hogback Mountain. Only one hike. I’ll get on that soon.

February in the Books

Looks like I am off to a pretty good start this year. I rode to work 15 times in February and managed to cover 506 miles in the month. Most of my riding was on The Mule which hit 40,000 miles last week. I switched over to Big Nellie for a few days, but barely rode my other two bikes at all (10 miles). For the year I have ridden 953 miles. That’s not half bad considering that snow kept me off the bike for several days.

I’m 100+ miles ahead of 2015 and have ridden to work 8 more times, although I had a leap commute this year.

Warm days with over 11 hours of daylight make me look forward to long bike rides in the country in only a month or so.

August by the Numbers

I have to say that I am a little surprised by my riding in August. I missed five days because of a car trip to Indiana. With the 26 other days of the month, I kept my stable of bikes pretty busy. I rode to work 18 out of 18 days (not counting one day of telecommuting). My parking space at work has grown some cobwebs this summer. (I haven’t used it since mid-June.) I had a false start with one commute when the chain on Big Nellie broke 6 miles from home.

All but one of my 18 commutes were aboard The Mule. Big Nellie had the other one. Big Nellie spent most of the month in dry dock, because its manufacturer twice screwed up sending a replacement fork. First, they sent the fork to the wrong bike shop. (I am told by Tim at Bikes at Vienna that this isn’t the first time they have confused his shop with this particular other one. ) Then the sent a second fork to the right shop, but it was the wrong size. If not for Tim’s intervention, they’d be unaware that their inventory is messed up.

I did some casual rides, two of which were metric centuries (around 62 miles). One was aboard Little Nellie, the second was the Hoppy 100.

I rode 563 miles just getting to and from work. I did another 218 miles on the weekends. That’s a total of 781 miles for the month, and 4,444 for the year. I ridden to work 119 times.