Long commutes

woodford2barbican

stevie_90210 wrote:

I stopped my commuting for the Winter a few weeks ago.

It just felt too dangerous and I'm doing this for enjoyment and fitness.

That makes me feel better...

I see from your previous posts that you are a rower. I used to do this, so one of my options is to get an Ergo at home, which I will supplement with the occasional run.

prawny

I stopped last winter for the same reason and haven't started again.

I've been going to the gym and enjoying riding instead of grinding out the same routes day in day out. I do miss it, but I've enjoyed not doing it too, although the trains have been sh1te recently which has made me think about it again.

clarkey cat

Another long commuter here: 21 miles each way.

Have found my mileage has dropped off with a mixture of darkness, my bike playing up and feeling a bit under the weather (SAD, maybe?) but getting the mileage up again now after a new bottom bracket was installed.

I think someone mentioned concern about riding a single speed for long distances. I use my fixie for about 30% of my commutes and generally only if the weather forecasts no wind! Then I actually find it a bit quicker than the geared bike.

Breakfast: I don't seem to find this a problem. Sometimes I head off with just a coffee and then don't eat until lunch. Over-eating is a massive problem for me when I'm doing high mileage so I try to restrict the amount of time I have to pour honey-nut cheerios and jam on toast down my neck in the morning!

graeme_s-2

Was a bit ice disrupted last week. Then on Friday I decided to ride in on my hybrid with Marathon Winter ice tyres. Set off from home and discovered it was a bit milder than forecast and I might have been ok on my road bike. Then I got knocked off my bike 3 miles from home by a driver failing to give way on a roundabout. Got a lift back home from the driver and took the day off sick. I now have about £600 of damage to bike, clothing and gear, a very sore neck and upper back (was at the hospital yesterday, it's all soft tissue damage that should heal) and some spectacular bruises on my legs and back. My ice tyre equipped hybrid is unrideable, and my neck is too stiff to ride. Luckily we should complete on our house this coming Friday, and then I'm off work until the new year.

Thus my long commute comes to a rather sad end .

outsider78

Hi everyone,

Been reading this thread with great interest.

Have been commuting 40-42 mile round trip commute for the past 4 months, 5 days a week.

I thought I could share my experience as well. Here is the route (roughly)

http://goo.gl/8rvLK

I don't eat before the ride, though have my supplements Vitamin C + Zinc tablet, two fish oil capsules and Pharmaton (really good for keeping focus during the day). Then have a bowl of cereal or a sandwich at work.

I am also trying to lose weight so I don't go crazy at lunch, just a bowl of soup and some chicken or rice etc. My desk is full of snacks like cereal bars, banana, oranges etc. I eat around 2-4 cereal bar during the day (+/-420kcal).

Dinners are also light, definitely no bread, pasta or anything like that, again, just soup or vegetables or meat.

Food wise I think its not so bad, I am usually hungry all the time so I don't worry about it too much

Biggest difficulty for me is to getting enough sleep. Usually going to bed around 9.30 - 10.00 pm most weekdays, past 11pm, then I am definitely feeling it in the next day. You must get your 7-8h. sleep otherwise its bad.

Other issue is the cold feet as most of you mentioned. If its beow 7C, I have my overshoes on. Double socks, wool socks etc. didn't work at all. Overshoes keep me warm enough to get to my destination.

And of course clothing is problem. I sweat a lot; with two thermal base layers, arm warmers and jacket seem to be OK between 7-10C but they get so wet, I had to put them on wet few times as they didn't dry in 8 hours!

Its really horrible to ride with wet clothes in the winter! So now I have a spare set of same clothes at work just in case. Make sure you have spare stuff at work or home or somewhere to dry them. Seriously!

In my bag; I have rain jacket, overshoes (regardless of the weather), two spare tubes, back up batteries, head lamp, puncture kit, air pump and so on... Also use two sets of red light and front lights.

Traffic isn't really helping around Kings Cross, Euston area. By the time you get there, you already wet, cold and tired... then you have to dodge the traffic to get out of Euston road. So keeping clean head and focus is really important.

Best time is 18.5 mph average, this was around October when it was still light. Can't even dream of it right now.

Worst time is about 14.47 mph with really strong head wind and a lot of traffic on Friday night. Usually average is between 15.5 - 16.7 mph most days.

Whatever the c***p feeling I am having during the ride, I just keep remind myself that I'd be on the tube or train if I wasn't on the bike. Probably getting depressed, stressed and bored... This would make me smile and keep going

Bordersroadie

Graeme_S wrote:

Thus my long commute comes to a rather sad end .

Bloody hell, mate. that's bad luck! I've been reading your blog with interest and am really sad for you that it came to such a bad end. I hope you make a swift recovery and are okay for your new short route soon. I can empathise as I had my first off in years just over a month ago, A&E visit, shoulder damage but no cars were involved in my case.

Best of luck for a straightforward recovery.

andyrr

Impressed by your 40 / 42 mile round trip commuting and doing that every day outsider78 - what bike are you riding : road bike I assume for that distance ?
Cold feet - I've just ridden in today with Diadora Chilli Extreme winter boots on my feet for the 1st time - fab and warm, I managed to squeeze P-X overshoes over these as much to keep them from getting too grotty as for additional warmth/waterproofing but with thin socks and temps just above 0 with wet roads, occasional sleet showers and I had absolutely no issues with water penetration or cold tootsies - 17.5 miles and about 70 minutes. Recommended - I've gone up 3 (!) sizes from my normal shoe size and fit with plenty of airspace. From Merlin at £38 inc their recent discount voucher code.

graeme_s-2

Have you got that discount code to hand Andy?

asprilla

I do 42 miles a day and have been using my Chilli Extremes for a month or so now. Excellent piece of kit of the cash.

However, most important thing for keeping your toes warm and dry is to have mudguards.

I never thought I would say it, but I've fallen in love with mudguards.

outsider78

andyrr wrote:

Impressed by your 40 / 42 mile round trip commuting and doing that every day outsider78 - what bike are you riding : road bike I assume for that distance ?
Cold feet - I've just ridden in today with Diadora Chilli Extreme winter boots on my feet for the 1st time - fab and warm, I managed to squeeze P-X overshoes over these as much to keep them from getting too grotty as for additional warmth/waterproofing but with thin socks and temps just above 0 with wet roads, occasional sleet showers and I had absolutely no issues with water penetration or cold tootsies - 17.5 miles and about 70 minutes. Recommended - I've gone up 3 (!) sizes from my normal shoe size and fit with plenty of airspace. From Merlin at £38 inc their recent discount voucher code.

Thanks Andy appreciate it,

Had to bail out at Paddington this morning though, way too windy. I must say it felt nice, reading paper, having a coffee and breakfast on the way .

Its a 2009 BMC road bike. Would love to have a winter boot for road bike but not sure those Diadoras would fit for me? (Speedplay pedals + DHB road shoes).

I have Endura Luminite Overshoes, which I find it OK for warm/wproofing but much more durable than usual Neoprene stuff. Neoprene material seem to rip apart very easily. Not sure about PX ones, but the one that I had last winter was really bad (Campag Neoprene). First the zip broken and the fabric started to slit and rip after 2-3 uses. It was in the bin after a week.

Don't know man, we're all seem a bit crazy riding bikes in mid-winter and discussing what keeps us warm .

Thanks for the advice though!

bendertherobot

Another 40 mile round tripp(er) here. On a Genesis Day One Cross. Important things for this time of year are a) loads of lights b) good tyres (Marathon plus for me) and c) good clothing.

My feet are far warmer this year with decent MTB shoes and Rapha/WoolyBooly thick wool socks.

andyrr

The Diadora boots are not huge, they're like tough looking road shoes with a goretex drawstring collar to tighten around the ankle to minimuse the water ingress. I felt a little moisture inside tonight but I wouldn't be too surprised if it's from the rain running down my legs and thus into the boot. P-X overshoes over my size 46s went fine - there's no zips or velcro, just judiscious stretching of the material to get around the heel. I'm using Look Delta pedals on a Trek SS roadbike. If I was to continue using road shoes (Carnacs) then I'd given consideration to taping up the vented uppers and checking the soles too for holes where water can get in and lead to wet and cold feet.
Kind of got off the topic of the long commute but if your riding for over an hour things like cold extremeties start to become a bigger issue than a 5 mile ride.
I've got 25mm tyres fitted and would consider going to 28mm - your BMC probably won't accomodate bigger than 25mm and for that little extra comfort and pothole survival it might be worthwhile upping to that if you are on 23s, especially in winter when dark and wet roads mean your more likely to ride over surfaces that in drier, brighter conditions you'd avoid.

Just to add in case you don't already, having a really good main light plus 1 or 2 backups is a sensible precaution - if your main one goes on the way in then that would allow completion of that journey and return home with decent lighting. Plus I have a spare tube at work as an em,ergency in case my spares got used coming in.

andyrr

Coming back to this thread : my personal circumstances changing as of next week (we've reduced to just a 1 car family instead of 2) and my wife is now about to start a 5-day a week job so I've now going to have to MTFU and 2-wheel it in or wimp out and buy a cheapo car to use on the occasional day.
I really don't want to get a 2nd car as I can forsee that costing £1000+ to source a reliable one then there's the usual running costs blah. I've a motorbike but that's a toy for good days only - it's not going to see the road again probably for a couple of months.
My commute is a 35 mile round trip and reasonably hilly which I'm currently tackling on a SS Trek. Like many SS/FG riders I know that it's just pretty hard work sometimes, no getting around it and last winter I loved the fact that when roads were really bad, on the days I did ride (I had my 4WD Impreza back then to choose) I didn't have to worry about gears giving trouble with freezing up and the simplicity was a boon. However doing this 5 days a week, potentially I can't cadge a lift from my wife, who is worried this is going to wear me out, I'll be covering 175 miles a week and little option of twiddling a wee gear to recover up the hills.
So ... is anyone else doign fairly big tough'ish commutes every day on an SS ? I spied a shimy Ridley X-Bow bike in the LBS recently which has lovely Avid-7's fitted and that really caught my eye - guards can be fitted and with clearance for knarly tyres would do well in the snowy stuff. At £875 it's no cheapo but a great bike for the price for winter wommuting ?
Thoughts please ?

Bordersroadie

If ever there was a good justification, for n+1, this is it! Your quick financial assessment is good evidence for getting something very nice and very shiny!

Sorry, can't comment on the SS issue, although my gears/brakes haven't frozen yet and I'm commuting all year round - I may just be lucky so far and I can see the sense in SS for this.

All the best.

andyrr

Cheers - I think I might give it a try at sticking with the SS through into early January just to see how it works out. That does of course mean that the X-Bow is very likely to have gone (it seems that lots of places are not holding much stock of the 2013 Ridleys, espec the disc equipped cx models) but there are other similar bikes around. Christmas/New Year will be slightly easier as that's when I or my wife will be off so I will either not be commuting or the car will be available. If n+1 is still a requirement then maybe there will be something appropriate in a sale somewhere. Lack of gears is not that common in giving an advantage for use or maintenance issues but there's been a number of occasions where I've had shifting issues caused by cables starting to freeze up or, trudging through snow-bound roads and the mech gets clogged up. Maybe the ideal is a hub-geared, disc-braked, yet lightweight bike. Or maybe an enduro style motorbike.

alidaf

Jebus, my commute is only 15 miles each way and I've only ever managed 4 days at most. My problem is that I don't sleep well at all and the waking up early is a killer. I use bad weather as an excuse to not cycle in but its never actually that bad when it rains. I have increased from twice a week to at least three so I don't feel too bad, but the tiredness...

andyrr

Well this past week I had a slightly easier week with the enforced no car option as I had a day holiday on Tuesday and I got a lift home Wed and Fri evenings so only 6 journeys, 105 miles total - still, according to bikehike mapping it totals just under 2100mtrs climbing for the week. Next week I've Friday off so at most will be 140 miles / 2700mtrs climbing. Will need to see what the weather brings - still running the SS so there might be some very hard rides in that lot. Quite fortunate in that a short walk from my front door takes me to a main A road which is a bus route and also close to council gritting facility so that road is normally quite clear of snow and ice even though we're located where we seem to get worse conditions than a few miles further away.