New Year’s Eve Winter Ride

Good Bye ‘06, hello ’07! As I write this, it’s FINALLY snowing. For the first time I can ever remember, we had a warm, brown Xmas. I don’t mind at all the above freezing temps, but it has been very hard to: 1. ski!! 2. take some time off the bike 3. justify eating more cookies (gotta keep warm!) 4. brag about how tough I am riding in below freezing and even below zero temps. This morning husband and I put on the ‘bags’ (rain jackets), dialed up the foot heaters and went for a ride. One local tough gal Sara bailed on us, but that only made us a little more resolved to at least try to ride it out. At 8 o’clock it was frickin’ dark out still–plain gloomy, but 41 degrees felt downright balmy once we got going. We rode hills around St. Paul keeping close to home just in case. This weather reminds me that I once read Seattle track guy Woody Cox (yup…) complain how hard it was to train all winter in wet conditions like this. Today still beats 15 degrees. Anyhow, I stayed warm but not dry. We turned in after 2.5 hours, 1.5 short of our original goal as my feet were getting cold as the temps seemed to have cooled. Several P&B sandwhiches, a hot shower, 2 loads of laundry and a short nap dreaming of sunny, hot days and many victories later, I feel refreshed and ready to take on New Year’s Eve! Yours, Barb

This fabulous post was written by one of our awesome bella volunteers ~ Sabine is the cofounder of Velo Bella and if you like this report, you can thank her with brownies and beer.