A Saturday Ride, With Wind!

I had been planning on getting a few miles in this weekend.  I had obligations yesterday which precluded a morning ride, so I figured this morning would be a great time for a ride.  I had thought of surpassing last weekends 20 miles.  Last night I checked the weather and the forecast for the morning was for light winds in the 5 to 10 mile an hour range, temps in the low 70's and sun.

So I got ready to head out this morning a little after 8:00 and imagine my surprise when I heard some strong wind gusts.  I didn't think much of it.  I checked my spokes, put air in my tires, put on my helmet and set out.  The gusts weren't bad heading up my street.  I made the turn out onto Blue Diamond and the true nature of the wind hit me.  It seems stating about 8:00 the winds kicked up to 20 mph sustained and gusts up intot he 30's from the SSW and I was pedaling West.  Right into the wind.

I decided to just keep the cranks turning for a bit and see what happened.  After 30 minutes I took a break, checked my Garmin and saw that I had only gone about 4 miles.  I rested for a minute then got back to it.  I made it to the junction with HWY 159 almost 15 minutes later.  I was done.  I was tired of fighting the wind and it was time for the pay off - downhill with the wind.  I made the turn and didn't really have to pedal most of the way back.

Looking at the Garmin record of the ride, I made it back in under 10 minutes and hit 31.4 mph - all without pedaling!  It sure helped the average speed for the ride. :)