Broken Wheel

My front axle and hub started to make odd noises recently. Returned the bike to the shed, and when I spun the wheel I could not believe how bad the bearings were.

Of course, I had the bike overhauled every year by the "Pro Shop in Austin." Which just goes to show you, ya gotta check the work no matter who they say they are. Not the first time they completely messed something up.

It might cost $15 bucks just to clean it up, but if the bearings have gone square, or the races are ruined, that's a whole other matter.

Damn.

Remember to Check the Weather

I took a longer loop today, intending to go over 30 miles to see how my LT would hold up. Well, instead of the expected beautiful weather, I somehow managed to depart into the wind during the passage of a front. Yup, that meant I went OUT in a headwind and came BACK in a headwind. Ah, the value of checking the weather forecast.

Also, of course, I was dressed for a southerly wind and came back in rapidly dropping temperatures. I ended up shortening the loop by about 5 miles, and did 26 miles averaging 11 MPH (!!!) . Windy!

Here is the GPS track of the loop (I borrowed my son's gizmo and bike, more on that below). Start top right-ish, head clockwise. Winds were SW at departure, NE half way through. Highway 36 is hard up against the mountains, winds hard out of the North:



GRRRRR. Well, another Colorado weather riding lesson.

Believe it or not, I might have actually made this weather happen. I took a short video of the beautiful sky over the mountains on an aborted ride the day before. If you listen closely, you can hear an intermittent "ping" in the background noise, that was my front wheel bearings about to fail. That's why I took Jordan's kit.

Back on the Bike in Colorado

Now that I'm living in Longmont Colorado, I've taken a few flat, short rides to try and get altitude adjusted and frankly to shake off the winter lapse (FYI, Longmont is apparently a suburb of Boulder to some, or a distant mad cousin of Boulder to others). Today I took a longer ride right up to the mountains proper.

It was a late start, around 5:30 and I got schooled in one of the things the locals say about the weather, "if you don't like it, wait 15 minutes." When I left I was quite warm in my standard cycling gear. By the time I got back, my lungs were searing from the exertion, cold and altitude. Ouch. I almost couldn't move my arms I was so cold. Oops. Bad Judgement.

Which reminds me of this quote:

"Good Judgement comes from Experience. Unfortunately, Experience only comes from Bad Judgement."

In a nice pasture bathed in some really nice setting sunlight, I ran across a herd of Buffalo grazing. That was pretty cool. And a couple of space antennas, reminding me of the fact that the US has some pretty cool installations in Boulder, e.g. NOAA, NIST and NCAR to name a few.

Here are the Buffalo:



And here are the Space Antennae:



Without the cold wind, it would have been a better ride, but hey, I'm a local now.