Riding with a Cold

It can be done, as I demonstrated today on the Sunday ride, but it has to be done with care. I got comments at the coffee stop for wearing a balaclava (and full gloves, and booties) when the temperature was about 8 centigrade--mid-forties, in other words. But it made getting started (new winter starting time of 9 am) easier. I also was careful not to push it. Did my turns at the front, but my pulls weren't the longest or the hardest. Our leader, John, was back from his long summer weekends in the Limburg hills. It was my first Sunday ride with him, a legitimate former racer, on the ride, and it's clear we have a natural leader (in addition to a sponsor). John also seemed to have the best legs today. We were lucky with the weather: cool, but sunny, and little wind. This is not typical Dutch fall weather, but the guys were commenting how things are different these days from twenty years ago: the leaves stay on the trees longer, in part because there seem to be fewer fall storms also. Still, there were plenty of (wet) leaves on the ground, and there were many turns we took a little gingerly. It being November now, it was striking how many people have already switched to mountain bikes. My group, they mentioned today, has 6 degrees centigrade as a lower limit for the road bike. If it gets any colder, they take their mountain bikes and look for sheltered, off road routes to our regular coffee stop, de Vuursche Boer, in Lage Vuursche (a "town" with a very high Hans and Grethel content) where we have our own table (we think). The others shook their heads when I said that last winter in Milwaukee, I had lowered my road bike limit to about 12 Fahrenheit. It doesn't look like I'll have too much use for all my heavy winter gear from Wisconsin here. For one thing, if it gets to be 12, I'll definitely be skating the frozen canals and lakes instead of riding my bike. Today I got 46 miles, and I had no trouble with my cold. Not that it's gone, but it hasn't gotten any worse either.