0 A Cold Morning Commute

This morning was the first really cold morning of 2012.  It was a real struggle dragging myself out of bed this morning at 6am, and I could very easily have stayed in my nice warm bed.

I made a great purchase last year and bought a long sleeve Merino wool jersey from Vintage Velos .  Not only is it warm on a chilly day, but super comfortable and harks back to a time when men were real men.

Suitably layered, I set out to ride some hills along Yarra Boulevard in Kew before work.  While Kew is a bit out of my way, I love being able to incorporate some hill climbing into my morning commute.  The great thing about Yarra Boulevard is that there is almost no traffic early in the morning, and there is usually some other cyclists around to either provide a cheeky draft if you're tired, or someone to chase if you're feeling fresh.

It was a nice easy trip to work after this along the new and improved Main Yarra Trail.  Because of the cold and rain, there was very few cyclists or pedestrians to contend with.

As you can see from the picture above, there was some absolutely cracking weather this morning in Melbourne.  Unfortunately there was also a LOT of icy showers that set in to an annoyingly constant rain by the time I was 30 minutes into my ride.  This is where the Merino wool became a liability, and by the time I got to work, I was soaked, freezing and feeling and looking like a drowned rat!

A great plus of my ride this morning was the performance of my new Continental GP4000 tires.  They are fast, smooth and corner with real stability in the wet.