Fenders

I have a little project going on.  I’ve kind of noticed that, after an absence of several years, Spring has returned to our part of the world.  It’s not that we haven’t had the season in the past few years, but hasn’t been the same season we expect.  For the last few years, we’ve had most of the features of Spring, and right on time too, but we seem to have missed the rain.  Seems like this year we are back to a more typical form of the season.  We’re having a wet Spring.  Sure, we get dry days, and sunshine days, and some chilly ones.  But we are also having a regular dose of those frog-drowning, torrential-deluge, raining-buckets-second type rainstorms.  Oh boy!

Let us make no mistake, rain is not bad.  Rain is especially not bad if it is warm.  For that matter, cooler weather is not so bad either…  If it is dry.  But mix large quantities of wetness with temps in the 50s or lower with blasting firehose type rain, and we get some pretty nasty conditions.

There is a personal situation too.  I’m tired of not riding outside.  I’m tired of skipping rides because I have to do rides.  (This could only happen to a bike shop employee!)  I’m tired of paying a lot of money for gasoline, when there is an alternative.  I don’t like being wet and cold.

The answer to the implied conflict is (cue drumroll, please)…  FENDERS! 

Well, not just fenders, alone.  Let’s make that fenders and rain gear.

The combination is unbeatable.  Good fenders and good rain gear, together, can convert the really nasty conditions common in early Spring, into a pleasant ride.

I know there are those among you, gentle readers, who have just had a full-on choking fit.  After all, equipping  bike with mud-guards (as the Brits put it) is just about the complete and total of geekiness.  One might even say that installing fenders on a road bike is the antithesis of cool.  But let me ask this.  What’s cool about not riding?  I should rather be thought a geek and ride, than to be thought cool, and sitting inside.

Up until very recently, the only bike I had, that was equipped with fenders was my redoubtable Tourist.  But that’s changing.  I’m mounting a set of good, high quality fenders on my commuter, and on one of the fixies.  Those fenders won’t stay there.  Once it gets warm enough so that I don’t mind getting wet, they can come off.  Until then, I’ll fly my geek flag proudly and ride happily in the rain.