Let me take you back to 2010’s Ride for Heart. It was a dark and stormy morning and Kris and I bundled the bikes into Dorothy and headed down the ride. Once on the Gardiner we realized that it was freaking cold. At one point i yelled out, “Anyone else think it’s snowing?” and some dude pipes up, “I was just going to say that!”. It was cold and shitty and wet, but it was for a good cause so everybody bit the bullet and kept going.
Fast forward to the purchase of the might Radon and my excitement to get out on a good ride with it. The route has been mapped for a week and I have been monitoring the weather network everyday checking on the weather. 8 degrees under a partially cloudy sky with rain coming in the afternoon. I should have known on the drive to Kitchener this morning when I hit Guelph Line and it started snowing that I was in trouble.
It will warm up, it will be fine…
Got to the ‘Rents, had some trouble with the pump and figured put on the extra shirt and I’ll be fine. WRONG! Holy sweet merciful crap, as soon as I started riding, my fingers were frozen and my legs were on fire. There was no way I was turning around, though, this was my first ride on the Radon and my first ride on a road bike overall. What a crazy difference thin tires make. If I hadn’t been frozen to the bike, I would certainly enjoyed it way more.
The ride was a little over 1h30m and I covered 36.08KM, including a brief little foray onto Township Road 14, which someone at the city forgot to PAVE! Everything survived the little back roads trip and I was soon back out on the road. There was a plethora of hills on this ride, which I don’t remember when I did the route in the car. That being said, the cadence average of 90 was out the window as a result and my average BPM was 150 with a max of 167. Just for the record I hit a max speed of over 50 KM/H.
Have a good long weekend,
Beez
PS I also broke in the Garmin Forerunner 305 on this trip and learned a very valuable lesson, remember to hit the start button…
