This morning saw the temperature rise to just below zero. I rode out to do another snow-ride. Concentrating on incorporating a lot of little climbs and descends I made my way to Nethen and Pecrot for some extra heightmeters. The snow was still offering good grip, not too icy so I took some more technical tracks as well today. Obviously taking care not to fall. I encountered 4 bikers on a descent - for them, I was climbing - on the Blue Bloso. They went fast. I looped back to meet them again near the Savenel but I didn't see them. I hope that they did not go too fast. There were some nasty ruts on that downhill. After an hour and a half into the ride it started to snow. Gently at first but when I pointed the Moots into the direction of Mollendaalbos for a last series of climbs it was snowing moderately. A strong wind was howling though the trees as I neared the edge of the Meerdael Forest. Overlooking the plains towards Opvelp and Beauvechain it looked like a white-out situation. I saw 3 or 4 bikers struggling in the fields trying to make their way into the relative shelter of the forest. Perhaps they were the ones I encountered a while back, perhaps not. I did not wait for them , instead I rode towards the Brise-Tout forestry house to start the loop I did last monday. When I was riding from Bierbeek towards the forest I could hardly see where I was going due to the snow and the wind. Arriving home I had a good solid ride with lots of heightmeters. All while not exerting myself too much although my average heartrate was a rather hight 130bpm. Here are some pictures I took along the trails today.

My Polar S710 heartrate monitor is getting redundant. Unfortunately the only PC I was able to read out the exercise data with, went to silicon heaven yesterday. On my newer PC, sporting Windows Vista 32 bits, the USB interface sometimes works, but more often does not. Polar does not support the USB interface on Vista so it kinda "works as designed" . My PPC turns 64bits Vista and that doesn't work either. So I decided to get my a brand-new Polar RS800CX Multi . Sporting a GPS sensor I don't have to put a speed sensor on each of my bikes either. I just have to wear the GPS sensor. The IrDA interface will work flawlessly with the Windows Vista and I can incorporate almost 10 years of Polar Precision Performance workout data into the new Polar ProTrainer 5 software.

Ride Stats : 34K and 505/605 heightmeters (Polar/Garmin) in 2h38mins

8648/93325