Weather and the Biker

Weather!

It's our best friend and our worst enemy.

I've been on  bike rides where we are cursing the headwinds for hours...

...until we turn around and find ourselves singing the praises of our now-tailwind!

This morning the weather was daunting.

The radar looked grim.

I needed to get in my 41 mile fast ride before 2:00 so I could pick up Mom from dialysis.



So I charged out to try to sneak in 10 miles before that band of storms hit Fishers!

Five miles out - into that pesky headwind.

Dark - and rush hour.

Just noticed - since her make-over my bicycle doesn't have any lights.

Oops.

So in order to stay living we hung to the sidewalks this AM.

At 4 1/2 miles the line of storms was right in our face.



Time to turn back and try to get home before lashing rain and deadly lightning added to our morning dangers.

Foolishly I found myself stopping periodically to take pictures -

but hey! what a dramatic sky!

And weather means everything to a biker.

What kind of weather will we face biking for 50 days across the country? - I began to wonder as the thunder began crashing to the south.



Looking at Mike's blog on last year's ride, it turns out they only had rain on 3 days; and in 2007 they didn't get hit by rain at all.

Temperatures?

Last year they had 2 days starting at 45 and 46 degrees.

Pack your under armour.







They also had 2 days in the 90s.

And all three of these temp extremes hit days 6-8 in Eastern Oregon!




Day 7 saw a temperature swing of 48 degrees!

Makes me rethink my cute new water-resistant bike pack that carries less clothes.

Winds? (Bikers always ask about winds!)

They had tailwinds 56% of the days.

That's pretty good.

And headwinds only 13% of the time.


But none of this was going to matter if I didn't survive this mornings training ride.

I dodged the traffic...

...avoided the lightning...

...And zipped onto our front porch just as the heavens let loose.

Three hours later I had blue skies and light winds for the rest of the 41 fast miles.

You've got to love weather....

It keeps our lives so interesting.