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Tuesday, January 24, 2012

Riding in the rain






Not sure what the deal is with riding in the rain. I have been doing it a very long time on mountain bikes and enjoy the heavy coating of dirt and mud at the end of a slip and slide ride through the trees over the slick roots and mossy rocks at a break neck speed.

I step out the other morning and looked at the sky and it was overcast and no real standing water on the asphalt and thought what the hell, I am going for a road ride. I have a rain bike that has some pretty nifty fenders that combats that gnarly wet stream from your butt to the top of your neck. The bar tape is cork and the tires have some pretty good grip. But not enough I guess. The skies let loose!

I was coming down a bridge transition around a corner doing a mild 35ish mph and a 3 foot long snake was coming out of the grassy shoulder across the road with a purpose.

I couldn’t avoid it since there was no shoulder to begin with and the traffic was fairly moderate so cringed as the reptile speed bump approached. Just in case any of you are contemplating running over a snake on your road bike in the rain I would highly advise against it.

As soon as I hit that thing it split like a banana and sent me down into a low side get off as if I was sliding into third base. I had snake guts, blood, sand and who knows what else all over my left side. Now I have a road rash that looks like the portrait of Bart Simpson and a colorful set of bruises that would make the northern lights jealous of its awe inspiring color spectrum.

So what did we learn today?
1. don’t ride your race bike in the rain (use your training bike)
2. don’t run over snakes (bunny hop them)
3. don’t wear your favorite kit in the rain (it is ruined)
4. tumble, don’t slide (cheese grater 101)
5. make sure you crash close to home so you don’t have to ride half naked for too long
6. clean off your bike before snake parts dry (nasty-ness)
7. road rash sticks to the sheets
8. if you don’t want to get sick, ride on rollers

2 comments:

  1. Yah, training here in Central Oregon in the winter is the suck. I don't do it.

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  2. Oh Brett what a awful ride. Hope your road rash heals quickly. But thanks for the laughs. Jessie

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