Tag: commuting

Ride Notes

lpaulriddle

After an aborted attempt last week, I “rode” my hard-tail MTB to work today. I put “rode” in quotes because I ended up hiking about half of it. Last week, it was a little too soon after the snow fell, and there was too much deep snow for me to want to deal with. Today was better, but I think I waited a little too long. About 50% of the trails were well-groomed and fun to ride, but the rest was icy from snow melting and re-freezing. Everything was packed down very well, and I was thinking to myself that studded tires would have worked really well in these conditions. Alas, I do not have a set of studded tires to fit a 29er mountain bike. Maybe I should get a pair, but I’d likely only use them a couple of days per year, so I’m not sure it would be worth the expense and the effort to mount/remove the tires every year.

More notes about the ride:

  • Weather: around 20ºF, light wind, sunny
  • Clothes I wore: Minus 33 merino wool short-sleeve shirt, regular long-sleeve cycling jersey, Canari long-sleeve full-zip winter cycling jersey, Performance Triflex winter cycling pants, 2 pairs wool socks, Altra Lone Peak waterproof trail shoes with fleece insoles, Yaktrax cleats, REI balaclava, Gore Windstopper heavy cycling gloves, Bar Mitts

This kept me nice and warm. As I’ve noted before, I stay a lot warmer riding in the woods than on roads, likely due to the slower speeds and the terrain/trees providing shelter from wind. I didn’t sweat much, either, and my clothes were mostly dry when I arrived at work. The Yaktrax provided great traction while walking over icy areas and crossing streams. However, I noticed later that they scraped a lot of paint off my pedals. Not ideal, but not the end of the world, and I have no regrets, as the cleats kept me upright (one of my primary goals nowadays). Due to the ice, the ride took 2 hours, which is a lot longer than I would prefer. All the same, I’m glad I was able to get out. I also like how clean the bike always seems to end up after a ride in the snow. Nothing at all like riding in dirt and mud!

Snow Commute

lpaulriddle

Today is my first work day of 2025. I took a little bit of extra time off during the holidays, and this week’s snowstorm delayed my return to work for 2 additional days. As a result, I hadn’t been to the office in 19 days. It’s nice to finally be out of the house again, but I enjoyed the time off. In the past, when I went to the office 5 days a week, I relied on bike commuting to stay physically active. During the long holiday break, I would start to go “stir crazy” because I wasn’t riding my bike, so I’d be ready and raring to go back to work after 10 days or so. Nowadays, I only commute 1 or 2 days a week, and I’ve transitioned to running as my primary form of exercise. I kept up my running throughout the break, so I never went “stir crazy”, and I was in no rush to go back to work. So, there you have it.

Yesterday, around 24 hours after the snowfall wound down, I went out for a run. As I learned last year, two keys to successful running after snow are: (1) wait until late morning or early afternoon to allow the sun to work on the roads a little bit; and (2) find a low-traffic road instead of relying on sidewalks and paths (which often are plowed/treated inconsistently or not at all). I’m fortunate to have such a road near me, so I made a beeline for it and did laps until I hit 10K. As I’ve done several times this season, I wore Xero Mesa Trail Waterproof shoes with liner toe socks, Correct Toes, and wool hiking socks, and my feet stayed warm and dry. The shoes have broken in nicely, and I think they’re going to work out great for these conditions. There were a few icy spots along the route, but once I got used to running over them, I felt fairly comfortable. The “ground feel” that minimalist shoes provide, combined with a correct gait, seem to help reduce the risk of slipping and falling on the ice.

For my commute today, I started out on the hard tail mountain bike. I was figuring that enough MTBers would have been out on the trails by now to groom them pretty nicely, but I was wrong — the PVSP trails around Belmont were mostly footprints, with nary a tire track to be found, and it was not good riding at all. About 0.25 mile in, I turned around, went back home, grabbed my trusty 1993 Specialized Rockhopper, and hit the mean streets. I had not ridden the Rockhopper since last winter, and it was still outfitted with studded tires and Bar Mitts. All I had to do was put some air in the tires (had the bike not been ready to go, I likely would have ended up taking the car). The roads outside of PVSP were all plowed, salted, and good to go. In PVSP, the roads had maybe a quarter to half inch of snow covering them, with some ice in the areas where the snow had melted and re-frozen. The studded tires had no problem there, and I mostly sailed through at close to my regular speeds. All in all, a nice ride that brought back memories of my salad days of winter bike commuting.

Back on the bike

lpaulriddle

After a great fall mountain biking season, December has started off slowly. Today’s ride to work was my first time on a bike in 3 weeks. My last commute was Nov 27, and my last bike/geocaching ride was Nov 24. Weather, health, and travel have been the culprits — the fall drought finally broke around the end of November, and now we are in freeze-thaw season, which makes mountain biking tougher. Wednesday is my usual day to ride in to the office, but the past few Wednesdays have been rainy. 10 or 15 years ago, that wouldn’t have stopped me, but nowadays, I’m more apt to just telecommute on rainy days. Last week, I was out of town, and the week before that, I had another cold. On top of that, this time of year, I tend to start eschewing geocaching by bike in favor of hiking. So, there you have it — kind of a perfect storm. I expect the trend will continue for a while. Today was likely my final bike commute of the year (though there’s a small chance I’ll ride in on Friday). We’ve got a cold snap coming up, so I might try to get out on the mountain bike at least one morning next week while the temperatures are below freezing. On the weekends, I’ll likely continue to favor hiking over riding, at least through December, but we’ll see. I’ve learned over the years that with everything going on during the holidays, it’s best to be flexible with planning these kinds of things.

MTB Season Again

lpaulriddle

I haven’t been doing much biking lately, outside of commuting to the office once or twice a week. My weekend biking/geocaching excursions have become fewer and farther between, due to a combination of busy schedule, running taking priority over biking, and lack of interesting caches being hidden within biking distance of home. I expect I’ll get out on a few more weekends this year, particularly with the pool now closed, which removes swimming as another exercise option. I’ve been splitting my commuting between road and mountain biking, with a strong preference for the latter. Every time I commute on roads, I wonder how I did it 3-4 times a week “back in the day” without going insane. It’s just a pain dealing with all of the annoying people who are out on the roads. Mountain biking is much more peaceful and enjoyable, though more so in the mornings when there are fewer people on the trails. Other than a week or two at the end of September, we’ve had great weather for mountain biking so far this fall. This morning was in the 40s and sunny, which is just about perfect. I’m taking advantage of it as much as I can, before we start getting hard freezes, which lead to muddy trails in the afternoons.

One thing I’ve been rather unhappy about this year is my lack of kayaking during the second half of the season. I was really good about getting out in the spring, but haven’t been out since probably June. The brutally hot summer was the culprit early on. September and October are my favorite months of the year to kayak, but this year, schedule and transportation issues have been my undoing. I like to go out on weekday mornings, but I need a car to do that, and this year, my son has been taking the car to college most days. I’ll probably have to break down and go on a Saturday or Sunday morning if I want to get out before the season ends. I suspect that a drysuit is in my future at some point, as I’d love to keep paddling year-round. Not sure if that’s in the cards for this year or not, though.

Summer MTB Commute

lpaulriddle

Historically, I have not done much mountain biking in the summertime. The main reason is that the slower speeds and shorter bursts of exertion tend to get me extra hot and sweaty. Conversely, with road biking, there’s a consistent cooling breeze from air resistance, and the amount of exertion is more uniform, allowing for better regulation of body heat. The other issue I have with mountain biking in the summertime, particularly commuting to work, is poison ivy. My usual route takes me through a few exposed areas where the trail is narrow, with dense growth on either side that includes poison ivy.

It has always bugged me that there are so few days each year that I consider viable for commuting to work by MTB. In the winter, trails are frozen in the morning, but a muddy mess in the afternoon thanks to the freeze-thaw cycle. In spring, winter melt-off and rains make everything too muddy. Summer has the aforementioned issues of overheating and poison ivy. That leaves autumn as the only season where conditions are “ideal”, and now, it’s hard to ride in PVSP in the fall without getting coated in seeds from the wavyleaf basketgrass that is slowly taking over the entire watershed.

I would really like to do more mountain biking, but if I’m not getting my MTB time in while commuting, it’s tough to fit it in along with other activities like paddling (which I’m looking to extend into the colder months eventually), climbing, road biking/geocaching, etc. It seems like the answer is to stop waiting for ideal mountain biking conditions, and learn to adapt, kind of like what I’ve done with my road bike commuting over the years. To that end, today is not a day I ordinarily would have chosen to commute by MTB. It started off in the mid-70s and humid, and there is a heat advisory for the afternoon (a near-daily occurrence lately). I suited up with my usual summer biking garb, including a double-thickness Sweathawg helmet liner (one of those things that I wonder how I got along without for so many years). I rode Belmont Trail, Garrett’s Pass, Grist Mill Trail, and Soapstone/Starstruck. The shortcut trail that connects Rolling Rd to UMBC Blvd always gets too overgrown in the summertime, so I avoided it, opting instead to ride Rolling Rd to Wilkens Ave and then into UMBC via Hilltop Rd. The route had a few miles of pavement to help cool me off, and avoided areas with large amounts of PI (with the exception of a short stretch of Belmont/Morning Choice). The trails were dry (but not too dry) and fast.

On the way home, I usually enter the park via the Soapstone Trail, but the top of it is a veritable forest of poison ivy this time of year. Today, I think I’m going to try taking Foxhall Farm Rd to Vineyard Spring Trail. Another option would be to skip the Baltimore County side altogether, ride down Gun Rd, and enter the park at the railroad crossing. The former seems like it would be a better ride (other than the start along Wilkens Ave). It will be a lot hotter than this morning, so this will be a good litmus test of whether this will be a viable option in the summer. Another barrier to commuting in the summer is afternoon thunderstorms, but that hasn’t been an issue with the current heat wave, as it’s been exceptionally dry recently.

Snow Ride

lpaulriddle

Nowadays, I don’t bike as much in the winter as I used to (opting instead for hiking/treadmill) but I still try to get out a couple of times per week. However, the snow we’ve gotten recently has further reduced my riding. Last Wednesday, I commuted to work on my old Specialized Rockhopper. I had not ridden this bike in almost a year, but I did get it tuned up at the shop recently. The morning temperature was in the teens, and the afternoon temperature was in the 20s. I rode with studded front and back tires for the first time in at least two years. It brought me back to my early bike commuting heyday, when I was obsessed with riding year-round in every imaginable weather condition.

Today, I took a mid-morning mountain bike ride. It was my first time (that I can recall) riding in the snow. It was a little too cold at dawn, so I waited until 10:00, when it was a little warmer, but still well below freezing. With a thaw on the way (it’s 37 as I write this) and sloppy, rainy weather coming later in the week, it’s looking like the window for snow rides isn’t going to last beyond tomorrow morning. Today, the trails were great, with most of them having been nicely “groomed” by earlier riders. Other than a few icy sections (mostly in sunny areas), the trails were in great shape, and fun to ride. I learned that snow riding (even on groomed trails) requires more physical effort, and different skills, than “regular” riding. I rode my hard-tail bike, which has new tires, and they gave me pretty good traction. I found that it was rather easy to overshoot turns and end up in the deeper snow on the edges of the trails, which generally causes the bike to lose traction. I was able to recover from this a few times, and others, I had to put my foot down and scoot the bike back onto the trail. I felt kind of like a beginning rider again. I suspect that if I lived in a snowier area, I’d get pretty good at this, but I don’t see it happening in Maryland. I only rode 7.5 miles, but it took me 90 minutes. I’m really glad I got out, as rain kept me off the mountain bike for most of December and early January, and it looks like the rain will be coming back later this week. I’m not sure when I’ll get another opportunity to ride in the snow, but I had fun today.

Bike Commute Notes

lpaulriddle

Today was most likely my penultimate bike commute of 2023. Unless I decide to go to the office an extra day somewhere, my final commute this year will be on Wednesday, December 20. The morning leg of today’s commute was pretty nice, with temperatures hovering in the low 30s and light winds. We’ll see how the afternoon leg goes. I was initially considering commuting by mountain bike, but ultimately decided to stick to pavement, mainly because we got a lot of rain this past Sunday, and have had a couple of freeze-thaw cycles since then. I figured that the combination of the two would be a recipe for muddy trails this morning. I am pretty sure I made the right call. The one or two areas in the park where I ride over dirt were not completely frozen, and rather soft. While other areas that see less sun were still frozen, this afternoon’s upper-40s temperatures will likely make them muddy for the afternoon commute. For optimal winter off-road commutes, you either need solid below-freezing temperatures all day long (rare, and even then, areas that get a lot of sun will still turn muddy), or you need several days with no overnight freezes and no precipitation (also rare). As a result, I end up braving the salty roads in the winter more often than not, and getting my mountain biking fixes in during “dawn patrol” sub-freezing rides before work on telecommute days. If it gets cold enough tonight (the predicted low is 26), and I can get myself out of bed, I may see if I can do that tomorrow morning.

Cold Commute Notes

lpaulriddle

Very cold day today for November. It felt kind of like January. I remember one year back in the late ’80s or early ’90s when we had a November cold snap and temperatures stayed below freezing for several days. Today started out in the low 20s, and looks like it’s going to max out at around 40, which pales in comparison, but is very cold by recent standards. Being a Wednesday, it’s my usual day to go in to the office. While I used to bike in cold weather all the time (and still do occasionally), and I have biked in colder temperatures than today’s and lived to tell the tale, I have to admit that nowadays, it’s no longer my first choice. I considered going to the office tomorrow (Thursday) instead, as it’s supposed to be a little bit milder (upper 20s). Ultimately, though, I opted to stay with today because it fit my schedule better.

The ride was not bad. I could tell the temperature was above 20, because the condensation from my breath was not freezing inside my nose. The wind was fairly calm when I left the house at 7:30, but it picked up during the second half of the ride. I wore three layers on top, and tried out a new REI brand PolarTec hinged balaclava. Although the fit is snug with my current helmet, I think it’s a winner. I have another fleecy balaclava that I’ve frequently worn on sub-20º mornings, but it doesn’t do the greatest job wicking perspiration, and as a result, gets quite damp over the course of a ride, which is not something you want on a frigid day. The PolarTec seems to do a better job. Although I got the sense that my head was beginning to sweat towards the end of the ride, the balaclava was mostly dry when I took it off. My feet got a little bit cold, as they always do, but warmed up as I climbed out of the Patapsco River valley. My trusty Gore-Tex winter cycling gloves, combined with Bar Mitts, kept my hands reasonably comfortable for most of the ride. I rode a shade under 14 miles, which is shorter than my usual morning commute, but not bad for a cold day. The afternoon commute home promises to be about 15º warmer, so I’ll shed at least one layer, and switch to lighter gloves and a lighter balaclava.

On an unrelated note, 7:30 seems to be a good time to leave the house when I’m commuting via road bike on school days. While there’s still occasional foot traffic for the middle school, it’s not really a problem. The biggest issue this year has been dealing with school bus traffic on Lawyers Hill Road, but by 7:30, they all seem to have finished running their routes. It’s also early enough that I don’t have to deal with a lot of traffic for the elementary school in Relay.

November Rain

lpaulriddle

With colder weather and shorter daylight hours looming, I’m starting to fall into my wintertime routine of only going in to the office once a week. I rode my mountain bike the past two times, and as a result, today was my first commute on roads in over two weeks. It almost certainly was also my last bike commute before we set the clocks back this weekend. That, of course, means much earlier sunsets, which was a big deal back in the day, when I commuted multiple days per week and left the office later. Nowadays, I try to roll by 4:00pm in November and December, which gets me home before dark. I only ride in the dark on rare occasions when I’m delayed leaving the office, or in the mornings in early November and early March (the beginning and end of daylight time).

November is probably my favorite month of the year, but as with any other time of year in Maryland, the weather can be fickle, and this morning was exhibit A. The forecast was for a brisk, chilly day, and they got that part right. When I left the house, it was about 40ºF with a gusty breeze. Then, as I was riding through Patapsco Valley State Park, it started drizzling. I thought it might be just a few stray sprinkles, but it kept drizzling off-and-on for my entire ride. Fortunately, the rain was light enough that it didn’t soak into my clothes. Had I known it was going to rain, though, I likely would have traded my trusty REI cycling windbreaker for a rain jacket and hood. All’s well that ends well, but it does go to show that you always have to be prepared for inclement weather (and darkness) this time of year, in spite of what the weather forecast says (or doesn’t say, in this case).

Biking Report

lpaulriddle

I had originally planned to go kayaking this morning, but it was a little too cold for me to feel like venturing out, even with a wet suit. The forecast is showing a warming trend for the second half of the week into the weekend, so I may try to make something happen later in the week, although my schedule is a little tight. We’ll see. In lieu of kayaking, I decided to take a mid-morning bike ride around the airport loop. A geocache puzzle I solved this morning provided extra motivation, as the final cache location wasn’t far off the BWI Trail. This ride is a 23-24 mile round trip from home, which is about the same length as my round-trip commute to and from work. It was my first road ride in 8 days, and my first time riding my single speed bike in at least a couple of months. I used to commute with this bike regularly, but it does not have an easy way to mount a rack and panniers. Back in the day, I used a rack that clamped to my seat post, which I think I still have, but I was never a big fan of it. I suppose I’ll have to break down and use a backpack if I want to re-introduce this bike to my commuting rotation. But, I’m going off on a tangent.

The timing for today’s ride worked out well. I left after all of the area schools had started, and returned home before they let out. Traffic was manageable. Going forward, I’d like to try to work these kinds of rides into my schedule more often on weekdays, especially during times of the year when I’m only going to the office once a week. In particular, I think it’ll allow me to get out on my mountain bike more often during the winter months. On days when trail conditions are bad, I can do something similar to what I did today, either looping the airport, or maybe riding out to Columbia and logging a few miles on the CA paths.