Today was test ride number 3. After a false start, I skipped doing laps in my neighborhood and headed straight out to the main road near my house. Unfortunately, my new wireless bike computer didn’t get the message so I stopped after a half mile to try to fix it. It started then stopped then stayed on. I have no idea why it worked perfectly for the first two test rides and now was glitchy. Maybe the battery in the sensor is worn out. Time will tell.

I rode over to and across the GW Parkway. No cars were coming so I didn’t get to test my starting skills. They need work as you will see below.

I headed north toward Old Town, Alexandria by way of Fort Hunt Road. This is a 35 mph two-lane road. It features a quarter mile long downhill. I feathered the brakes and kept the top speed to 25 mph (I could easily hit 35 with more confidence.) There was a traffic light at the bottom but I had the green so once again I didn’t get to practice starting from a standstill. Over the next half mile I climbed up two small hills. Another traffic light failed to cooperate so I rode unimpeded all the way to Old Town. I encountered still another traffic light at South Washington Street. This too was green. I was beginning to think my Streetmachine had some sort of traffic light sensor on it.

I rode under the Woodrow Wilson Bridge passing through some bollards without clipping them, up Union Street, and across two sets of railroad tracks without stopping or any other incidents. I picked up the Mount Vernon Trail and rode through a chicane at a decommissioned power plant (every bike trail should have one.) Here I encountered the world’s slowest pedestrian, a young man deep in conversation on his cell phone. I couldn’t pass him because we were approaching a blind curve. (Good thing I didn’t because a bike was coming our way.) I slowed and stopped for Mr. Cellphone. When I stopped I was in the middle of a cloud of midges. Ack. It took a couple of attempts but once Mr. C cleared the blind curve I was underway again and free of the bugs.

I made it to Daingerfield Island, a convenient turn around point. Before the ride, my friend Charmaine had invited me to have lunch at a pizza place on busy Duke Street but I told her I needed to do more test riding and Duke Street is a car sewer, unsafe for test riding. She hooked up with Reba, a mutual friend. They both are bicyclists and were interested in seeing the Streetmachine. After hanging out for a bit on the Island’s river side deck, I texted Charmaine that I was heading back south.

After a couple more false starts I was underway. The ride back was a piece of cake. No issues at all. I stopped a few times to drink water and got underway with just a wobble or two each time. I crossed the GW Parkway again. I made it halfway across and had to stop at the traffic island in the middle. I made it across the second half of the highway with nary a wobble at the start.

My route took me mostly on the relatively narrow Mount Vernon Trail. I managed the width much more confidently than yesterday.

I shifted to neighborhood streets with little traffic. As I approached Fort Hunt Park I heard someone call my name. Charmaine and Reba had tracked me down by borrowing my wife’s cell phone which has a tracking app. Clever.

We had a nice chat. Then they wanted me to show off my skills. I started to push off with my right foot and lost my balance to the right. I pulled my foot off the pedal to arrest my tilt. To my surprise. my right shoelace had somehow wrapped around the pedal. When I pulled my foot off, it yanked the bike sideways and down I went. Hard, bearing most of the impact on my upper right arm. Ow.

After the appropriate interval of cussing and pain assessment, I stood up and righted the bike. The bike didn’t have a scratch on it. Me not so much. I had a nasty straight line cut above my left ankle (from either a pedal or the big cog on my chainring). I also had some road rash near my right knee. Reba, being a nurse, insisted that I clean my wounds and even provided some unopened bottle water and clean paper towels.

Once I cleaned up I got going and did a few turns for my audience. Then we parted ways and I rode into the park. Oddly, my front derailer stopped working. The shifter kept slipping into my (easiest) granny gear. I stopped and checked the cable. All good. I tried riding holding the shifter in place but found this annoying and let the chain drop onto the granny gear for the last three miles of my ride.

There is a silver lining in these clouds. Since I was stuck in my small chainring, I discovered that starting in the granny gear is quite a bit easier than using the middle or large chainrings.

Interestingly, the distractions of the computer and the shifter meant that I wasn’t paying much attention to my riding technique. I was riding on automatic pilot and the last couple of miles went by very smoothly.

I called Tim Fricker for advice about the shifter. He explained a simple adjustment was all that was needed.

As for the bike computer, I’ll probably put a new battery in. If that doesn’t work, I’ll take it back to the shop.

Another 31 miles in the books. Tomorrow, another nice weather day, will be the final test ride. Hopefully, I will keep the rubber side down for this one.