It should be Glaringly Obvious....

With the recent time change come some different lighting conditions.  Depending on the timing of your morning commute, you are likely to encounter some early morning low angle sun.  This makes those Nevada pitted windshield really hard to see through.  So be alert to the fact that drivers have an extra excuse "not to see you" on the road. Other than that....enjoy the beautiful morning commute!

What do you think...faster....or slower!?

Have you ever had that sinking feeling.....seriously, like when you notice something isn't quite right?  You can truly feel it.  The sound the tire makes, that gentle hum has just a little different pitch.  Each pedal stroke feels just a little harder than it should.  You feel like you're your riding a low rider that's slowly getting a little lower!

Yep, you've got a slow leak in a tire on the morning commute.  So, it's evaluation time, eh?  Just how slow is that leak?  How long did it take you to notice?  And now after that critical evaluation, what to do?

In my case, I'm riding a large 700c tire, meaning it holds a ton of air and takes quite a while to go flat.  If I was on my road bike with a 23mm tire, it might go down in less than a minute.  So I chose not to stop and patch, but rather ride out the last 3 miles as fast as possible.  Now this poses another question, if you're really close to flat, can you ride fast?  Flat tires don't tend to roll too well!  If you got a little more pressure left you can dig deep and push as hard as you can to make it in time. 

In my case (as shown above), I was fine.  Even when I got to work the tire still has 20-30 psi left in it.  I found the single tiny goat head and determined it was just barely leaking....in fact, this has probably been going down for a couple days.  Once removed and patched it should be good until I find the next pokey object!

So, to answer the title question......I had a faster ride with my slow leak, but only because I was too lazy to stop and patch it before I got to the office!

If you ride a bike....hot chicks will follow you (or perhaps pass you)!

I was on my leisurely morning commute, when I notice I had a rider in tow.  So, what to do?  Continue riding leisurely and have a chat with the other rider....hammer for a bit and drop the competition....or perhaps with either response get dropped by a girl!  I believe the term is "getting chicked" (at least in ultra-running).

Here was my view at 1 mile in:

 And my view at 3 miles in (she's gaining):

 At 6 miles:  (just....can't.....drop....her.....!)

Oh....opps....that would be wifey joining me on the commute.  I'm not sure what I'll get in more trouble for, calling her a hot chic or even evoking the idea of hammering it and dropping her.  I'm sure I'll find out when she reads this!

The morning commute....

Here's what I saw this morning, and yes, sometimes it's just a bike ride and not too much happens.  So you make up the content as you go!

Spring is here and there is actually bike traffic in my neighborhood!

Bike to work week is coming soon.  Giant piles of pancakes will soon be served in this location!

Technically, the sign does say 2 hour parking....however, just because the sign is on the sidewalk doesn't mean you park there!  I guess this is following the law to the letter!