It’s been a solid week now since last week’s bike commute home, otherwise known as “Snowfest on Wheels.” The meteorologists all said we were only supposed to get 1-3 inches of snow during the day but by 1 pm there was already 3.5 inches on the ground and it was still going. By the time us regular bike commuters suited up to go home there was 4-5 inches on the ground.
As two of my coworkers and I set out for the ride, we all knew that it was going to be an adventure. The frontage road that we start off on gets traffic, but not like a through road, so the snow was plowed and driven on just enough so you could bike on it decently well as long as watched out for patches of slick slush. Once we turned off of the frontage road the real fun began.
The Southwest Commuter Path was full of unplowed snow that was however crisscrossed with ruts from other bikes that already had made the passage through. If your balance and handling was perfect, you could stay right in the track that someone else had made. As soon as you hit the side of that rut however, you had to jerk on the handlebars to stay upright and use all of your might to stay upright. I affectionately call this “pilates on wheels” as you’re using a lot of your core muscles to stay up and moving forward. The large 2.1 inch tires on my mountain bike were not helping my progress. Neither was seeing one of my coworkers just slice through the rutted snow with his inch wide tires. Normally, my big tires can float on fresh snow. That night however there was just too much wet heavy snow and too much traffic that had gone through it.
Normally I turn off onto the street after just over a half mile of the bike path, but when it snows enough I continue on the path and do my “snow route,” which takes me just a half mile further than my normal route. I struggled with my coworkers on another mile or so of path before I turned off onto another path that cuts along a golf course runs to a decent traveled road. As soon as I turned off, I hit rough snow and had to jump off and walk. Because of the rough snow, I wasn’t able to get back on the bike and ride so I had to trudge through the snow, dragging the bike to the road. Once I hit the road, I took to the sidewalk and the trudge continued. I finally got to a section of sidewalk that was freshly run through with a snowblower (I waved to the homeowner) and was able to mount my bike again and get going. Sure there was some covered sidewalks, but the snow was fresh enough to plow through, fresh enough that it was fun riding. Eventually I crossed the busy intersection that ends this stretch of route and made my way to a less traveled bike path beginning at a YMCA and running to my part of the city.
This bike path had far less action before I got there. There were only two sets of wheel tracks and one set of footprints (pretty sure it was someone pushing one of those aforementioned bikes). The snow was fresh and pristine so I got bulldoze through the snow in a good clip. Most of the time the snow was around the 4 inch mark, but every now and then there would be a drift that the snow was hub high. At those points I just had to build up momentum beforehand and hold on as I went through. The worst part was the hills, which normally are quite small. However, with all of the dense snow bogging the bike down, that simple small incline turned into a mountain. It’s been a long time since I biked (or did any exercise for that matter) that made me dry heave, but I needed that type of effort to even attempt to get up the ascent. On both of the two “major” hills, I needed to get off about ¾ of the way up to catch my breath and start walking. I know I stopped a third time somewhere along that stretch of path just from being so tired.
After the YMCA bike path, I was in the homestretch and had just a mile of road before home. Here I just took the road and dealt with the few cars that shared it with me. The road really wasn’t that bad – here I realized I should have just stayed on the roads and taken my normal route home. I biked that small stretch home and only stopped for a stoplight, where I’m sure all of the drivers around me thought I was crazy. At home, I opened the garage door and grabbed the ice scraper brush. I had to do something to dust all of the snow from the bike.
Once I managed to trudge up the stairs to our apartment, take a shower, and change, I felt completely dead. It took me a half hour longer to get home and I hate to fight to stay awake at only 7 pm. Still with that said, what did I do the next morning? I jumped on my bike and began another day of bike commuting.
