This weekend was the first REALLY cold ride of the season. It wasn’t that the weather was insane so much as the gloves I wore trapped sweat on my hands then froze them horribly!! I started the ride with some slim fitting (which are still huge) snowboarding gloves that I thought would defeat the cold. After about an hour of riding my fingers turned to popsicles and I had to swap out gloves to the Giro Westerly Wool. The Westerly Wool’s work great down to about 40’ish degrees depending on how long you’ll be riding, but not so much for the low 20’s on top of the mountain… and who knows what the wind chill was coming down; but the Westerly Wool’s did a hell of a lot better than those damn hand refrigerators I started out with. Two things I need immediately… a solid cycling purposed winter glove and face cover. Then I’ll be set.
Complaint sess over… Now, as mentioned in the previous post, “Early morning rides are peacefully eerie.” This Saturday morning ride was. AMAZING!!! I started out at Blevins Bicycle Co. and rode 6 miles north to the start of the climb. Facing headwinds close to 20 mph… it was a solid warm up for the chill I was about to face. I duck into a neighborhood to minimalize the wind until I get up to the climb. No one is awake yet. No cars on the streets. Just me, the wind and Old Man Winter. I jut my jaw forward to blow my warm stank coffee breath on my nose that helps keep Old Man Winter at bay. Just getting to the start of the climb, the heat is kicking in and I know I’m totally good for the next slow 7’ish miles to the top.
As I climb, the fog is setting in. The frost is growing on the low bushes and brush. It’s incredibly beautiful and getting increasingly colder. With my popsicle’esk fingers, I pull out my iPhone and start snapping away. I had a lot of ideas of what I wanted to capture but couldn’t really move my nubs to take the photos, so I opted for only a couple spots I knew would be way rad.
The photo below is on the climb up via an old closed down portion of the road. About 400 meters further up, everything is icy white. I start getting really amped. Two spots cross my mind. The overlook at the top of the route and this relatively flat mountain bike trail that would be so good to ride and shoot in this weather. I prop my bike up against the wall… snap, snap, snap… take a look at how the three turn out and right after the third preview (with 58% “battery life” left) my phone dies due to cold… Old Man Winter killed my phone!!
As I damn my phone and Old Man Winter, I contemplate riding the MTB trail anyways… then the thought creeps in, ‘I only have one spare tube. I had a double flat last wooded ride. My phone is dead. No one is dumb enough to hike this today. I will die.’ So I turn around and start heading down the mountain at a very uncomfortable chill level.
Long story longer… I make it back to Blevins, change out of my newly acquired UPNESS kit and coverings. Drink a cup of coffee and share my freeze story with the fellas.
