Only the hard core

I love my bike.

Today the skies cleared but it stayed really cold. They are playing the Masters golf tournament in Georgia and one of the recurrent themes that the TV announcers keep returning to is how cold it is in Georgia and in fact how cold it is everywhere in the country. It is a most unusual spring.

But it was 38, not that bad, and the winds were light, only about 9 mph NNW. I thought about it and thought about it and finally out I went. The big news is that Hamline Avenue has been swept pretty much the whole length. Hamline is a main riding route for me so this is a significant milestone each spring. Usually shortly after Hamline gets swept I can start riding my summer bike.

Maybe not so much this spring though. It is so cold that I am going to stay on the cross bike a while longer. The wider tread and lower pressure tires seem less likely to flat than the high pressure skinny road bike tires and I really, really don't want to be changing a flat in this weather. So I will be on the cross bike until the temperatures are consistently in a range where even without gloves I can maintain some finger comfort and flexibility.This is Lake Owasso from the northeast corner public access. I was hoping for a bit brighter and more blue and maybe a bit of the old glistening waters but I couldn't really get a good angle for the sun off the waters. I still think it is a pretty nice picture though, particularly compared to all the grey from the last week. The sky is blue.

But on a day like today only the hard core are out riding. I rode 8 miles before I saw another person on a bicycle and that was a helmet mirror wearing road biker. Then at 15.25 I met the second, a parka wearing comfort biker. Finally out on Como I encountered another person with the bicycle indicating that he rides a lot and the cold weather gear indicating that he rides even in inclement weather.

I got almost all the way home and was congratulating myself on being hard core when a family of 6 swung out in front of me, parents and 4 children aging from, oh say, 10 to 17 or so. They were on a variety of family bikes, a mountain bike or two, a comfort bike or three. They were dressed in a variety of mostly pretty winter wear, not a bit of bicycle wear visible on any of the six. But each and every one of them had a helmet.

So who is hard core here? Me? Or a family with at least 6 bicycles in the garage and 6 helmets in the closet to fit the 6 people who might be looking to ride on a day when virtually no one else is out on a bicycle?

Family Hard Core Bicyclists, I salute you.