19° at Pine Hill Park

I wanted to ride on New Years Day but it the high was 15 degrees and I thought it would be prudent not to ride in such cold temperatures. After today's ride I am don't think it would have mattered. Headed out to the park after grocery shopping. The sun was out and it was a blue bird day only by the time I got on my kit, put the bike in the truck and drove out to the park I had sun for all about 5 minutes.

Since my last visit some of the trails had been groomed.  Some were groomed on New Year's Eve and the a few more were done yesterday evening.  I headed up Furlough this time because it was groomed and yet it was a tough slog. Grooming is great but when it's fresh I find that it's not quite packed down enough to make it buttery smooth.

I was afraid I was going to be cold but in fact I was sweating again. In addition to my short sleeve base layer I wore a long sleeved cold weather, thermal top, short sleeve biking jersey and my Windstopper fleece hunting jacket. I also wore fleece snowboarding shorts with my winter cycling tights. I am on the fence whether to get bar mitts. One thing that’s keeping me away is eventually I will put some bar ends on.

I was tempted to try a ski helmet but my fleece skull cap works great and it snugs up my shokz giving me really good sound while I ride. I suppose if I go out even colder I might try the ski helmet.

When I turned on Droopy Muffin the trail completely changed. It didn’t appear to have been groomed but it was well ridden by other fat bikes and it was buttery smooth.

On the way back I rode Svelt Tiger and it too was packed down by bikes and buttery smooth. I switched out my pedals to Crankbrothers Double Shots and they were actually pretty good.  This way, if I am going to ride with another boot I can.

I didn’t bother to check my tire pressure but I noticed the rear tire was a little softer than the other day. Not sure if low pressure correlates with the number of dimples but the rear tie had 4 dimples and when I checked my pressure when I got home it was at 4 PSI.