Riding for exercise and entertainment needs to be early in the mornings in the midwest's hot and humid climate. I rode yesterday, on July 4, as well as this morning, and should have gotten rolling an hour or so earlier to catch a few degrees of cooler weather.
WHATEVER, I'm trying to re-establish a habit of regular riding. The benefits are immediate and fairly long lasting in lowering my blood glucose and lowering the amount of insulin I have to pump.
On July 4 I rode 9 miles and this morning I got in 6 miles.
While riding yesterday, again with missing gears in the derailleur, and when I took a rest break in the shade of a large tree in front of the LDS church building, I decided to have a closer look at the still-unrepaired front shifter. I noticed the cable was actually NOT broken at the shifter end, and upon closer examination, the other end at the handlebar lever was not broken either. It turned out the cable was stiff, so I assumed rashly that the cable had gotten stuck with rust from recent rains. After liberally squirting both ends with WD-40, and the shifter still barely worked only in one direction, I found a broken spring in the shifter assembly itself. This turned out to be impossible to "fix" with basic bike tools. The shifter guide is riveted together and the spring is very hard steel.... and will need to be replaced instead of repaired. It being the midst of the Fourth of July, it may take a few days or more to find a bike shop with a used shifter that will fit. I have only been able to find complete gearsets online, and the prices are such that I hope to find a used item instead.
So today I again rode with limited gearing, but these low altitudes and slight grades on the hills make for survivable riding with limited granny gears. I got going a bit late, but it began raining HARD almost as soon as I got back from the ride. While I was tooling around, it was sunny and hot, and I had no idea thunderstorms were building up. Thankfully I accidentally avoided getting soaked.
Wednesday:
Ride Started: 7:24 AM Ride Ended: 9:19 AM
Stats from the GPS: Total Miles: 9.45
Overall average speed Moving Avg Max Speed
4.9 MPH 7.2 MPH 30.1 MPH
Total Trip time Moving Time Stopped Time
1 hour 55 mins 1 hour 18 mins 36 minutes
Today:
Ride Started: 7:44 AM Ride Ended: 8:27 AM
Stats from the GPS: Total Miles: 5.98
Overall average speed Moving Avg Max Speed
7.7 MPH 8.0 MPH 28.0 MPH
Total Trip time Moving Time Stopped Time
47 minutes 44 minutes 2 minutes
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