Bike Riding in the Winter

So it’s nice and sunny today so I decided to go for a bike ride and go get lunch at Einstein Bagels. It’s sunny but it’s chilly so I bundled up; but the cold still made my eyes start to water a bit. I used to ride my bike in the winter when I was younger and I mean cold winter days with snow + ice. In particular I remember a few situations when I was riding in the winter:

  • Middle School – I used to ride it to school in the winter since it got me out of the cold faster (at least that was the logic). I think after having snow in the middle of the day and having to ride home in it I realized that didn’t work to bad either. The bonus of riding on the snow and ice is that if it’s icy enough for you to fall you’ll generally slide on the ice which hurts a lot less than falling off your bike on the cement.
  • Classes in the middle of the day – My senior year in college at Michigan State University I had a lot of classes in Holmes Hall (Lyman Briggs) and in the middle of winter I had a class down the road between a few other Holmes Hall classes. So I just kept my bicycle at Holmes Hall and drove it from there to my class and back again, it worked out pretty well except when the bike was buried deep in snow at the bike rack.
  • On the far side of campus – My first year at MSU I had a class on the far side of campus so I’d ride my bike out to class and as the fall went on it got colder and colder (and even colder) but I kept on riding my bike. Eventually it got so cold the wind made my eyes water to much (way more than today) so I had the bright idea of wearing my ski goggles. This worked great! An added bonus was since people couldn’t actually see my face they didn’t know who the dork on the bicycle was.

    In hindsight, the best investment I could have made in college was some kind of moped/scooter to get around. I’d recommend this to anyone with a kid going to college. The most useful thing my car was good for was getting me home when I needed to visit the folks (you had to park at a parking lot that was pretty far away). I probably couldn’t have seen this at the time since I’d had a car for ages it was just something I “needed”; I didn’t go away to college until I was 22(?) so this was pretty ingrained in my head as a necessity by this time.

    The car was great for getting groceries (I lived in a cook your own food dorm) but the expense of the car (insurance/etc.) far exceeded a few cab rides a month to get groceries. My car didn’t really become ultra useful until graduate school when I had a permit to park on campus (actually I could only park on the south side of campus but that was almost perfect for where I needed to be) which then allowed me to live a little farther off campus.

    So I’ve gone from bike riding on a nice day to riding in the winter to not needing a car in college. I guess I’m done with this posting for now. I’m heading back out in the 50° sun to ride back home….

  • One response to “Bike Riding in the Winter

    1. It is silly to have a car on campus. Our school had an extensive bus system. Of course, I had my car and TRIED to use that. My last 3 years, my graduate-level brother-in-law let me use his on campus parking pass ;)

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