Yesterday, as most of you know, was very cold in Denver, along with a few inches of snow. In the morning, it was in the low teens, and the snow was very light, dry, and unconsolodated. I decided to bike, and only added a couple minutes to my standard ride in. Things were substantially different on the way home.

By 3:30pm, the snow had been packed down everywhere by drivers. Some of it had melted (either due to the sun or icemelt dropped by plow crews) and refrozen, as it was cooling off again. I can’t imagine it getting worse and still being able to stay upright on a bike without studded tires. Several times I was absolutely positive I was going down, yet only once did I actually hit the deck. Montview was untouched by plows so instead of a nice bike lane, it was rough partially refrozen slush thrown by cars. Not great conditions for a road bike. I took the sidewalk along Colfax for the last couple miles, and got a big thumbs-up from an enthusiastic pedestrian.

Lesson learned: stay off the bike next time it snows.