Ridin' in the rain... we're just ridin' in the rain...

So far, tomorrow's 10am women's ride is still on. The forecast doesn't look too hot, so for clarification, the cancellation policy has been updated: if it is actually raining or snowing at 9am, the ride is off. Now, there is some gray area here too -- if it's just sort of misty out (like a lot of today was), we'll probably still ride unless it's cold enough to be forming ice on the roads. Real, honest-to-goodness rain will cancel the ride for sure.

So keep your fingers crossed for decent weather! Hope to see you there!

December 23rd ride is ON!

The weekly open women's ride is still happening this Saturday, the 23rd. As usual, it meets at the Lake Harriet bandshell at 10:00 AM. Hope to see you there!

Ride Report: December 2nd

Despite a temperature of just 13 degrees with a windchill below zero, 11 real Minnesotans showed up this morning for the first women's winter ride of the season. We did around 30 miles through St. Paul, where it is slightly less windy than Wayzata. We're all hoping for warmer weather next week, but hey, it's Minnesota.

One key detail missing from yesterday's post was the cancellation policy. There are two basic conditions that will cancel the ride:

- Temp is below 15 degrees at 9am. If it's borderline, we'll ride.
- Sidestreets aren't plowed by 9am after a heavy snowfall.

Today, the temperature was below 15, but not by much, so we called it "borderline" and went. But those days where it's 20 below? Stay inside!

See you next week!

Real women ride all winter!

It's true! Real women do ride all winter. Yes, it's cold, but it's not too bad if you dress for it. We will be running a couple posts in the very near future on how to dress for winter riding, but the basics are pretty simple:

1. Wear lots of clothes.
2. Lobster claw gloves.
3. Those disposable toe-warmers. You can buy these in grocery stores -- they're called Heat Treat (or maybe "heet treet," I'm not sure), and you just unwrap them and stick them to the outside of your (wool) socks before putting on your shoes. Follow with shoe covers or booties, and you're good to go.

The next couple posts will be on building a winter cycling wardrobe, first with technical gear, and second with regular ol' stuff for those who aren't committed enough (yet) to drop several hundred dollars on winter riding gear.

Why should you bother? Well, there's a very good reason. Starting tomorrow morning (December 2nd), there are weekly women's rides that are open to any and all women cyclists, regardless of team affiliation. These rides generally go west toward Wayzata, include a stop at Caribou Coffee, and then split into two groups: the first group heads home, for a total of about two hours (30 miles), and the second group continues on around Lake Minnetonka for a longer ride. These are social rides at an easy, base-building pace of around 15-18 mph. EVERYONE is welcome!

When: Every Saturday morning at 10:00 AM.
Where: The Lake Harriet bandshell, next to the Port-A-Potties.
What bike: Right now, any bike - the best winter bike is a cyclocross bike (more on this in a future post as well), but people also show up to this ride on old road bikes and right now even their good race bikes since the roads haven't been salted yet this year.

Note: Tomorrow, December 2nd, there is a 5k run starting at the bandshell as well. There will be a lot of people. We're meeting in the same place - just watch for the port-a-potties.

Hope to see you there!