An oasis in a the winter

A dry-ish, warmish, free-ish weekend in the middle of winter is a grateful break in the usual horrible riding conditions. A little ride out through Newbury and Hungerford yesterday followed by a ride through Winchester and Romsey today has restored the lost passion for riding that a couple of cold winter months has taken.

The biggest nod of the day was saved for the MV Augusta F4 rider coming out of Andover. My bike has rotted in the winter salt and if I had an F4 in the garage rather than the Viffer I think I could resist the urge to ride just to preserve it.

The build up to the 2008 road trip season has started. Planning and list making has begun and I'm counting the days to the better weather and some time off.

Icy passion.

Over a week of bike commuting has left me with a strange view on winter biking. All the time, bar a quick 30 mins on Sunday, spent on the bike over the last 3 weeks have been for commuting to work. I have been looking at my bike in a different way. A tool, a machine for a purpose rather than an object to get passionate about. Then......today I used the Rover to get to work. I hated it and spent all the time sat in the car wishing I was on my bike. I realised that the passion may drop under the surface but it still burns brightly.

Winter Commuting

After 2 days of having to de-ice the Rover for 10 mins in the morning and 10 mins in the evening for a 5 minute journey I decided that riding into work is preferable to the frustration of having to de-ice. Weds morning was -5Deg on the way to work and I tested out the new textile trousers which kept most of the cold at bay. Riding home was not at much fun. Although it had warmed up to a very pleasant -1Deg the roads had become super slippy. I had one of the biggest moments on the viffer I have ever had. On the exit of Tesco’s roundabout I flicked from right to left and the bike shimmied, bucked and weaved and I do not know how the bike didn’t go down. I will claim it as amazing bike control but in reality I know it saved itself once I had relaxed and let it ride it out. Maybe the big bags of spuds, carrots and leeks in the backpack ruined the weight distribution?

Riding in these conditions is not fun in the same way as on dry, grippy, summer roads but it still gives me a buzz a car never could. Maybe it’d dodgy the iced up, vision impaired cages? Or maybe the buzz comes from making it to work staying shiny side up?