cycledorchy

Hi all. I'm new to cycling and new to the forums. I'm currently living in Cinco ranch in Katy outside Houston, and I'm starting to ride for fun, fitness, and eventually, for charity too. I don't have a good bike yet, I am shopping for and saving for a decent entry level road bike...so for now, if you see an increasingly less but still somewhat overweight guy riding a cheapo red mountain bike along cinco ranch boulevard or mason road, don't make fun! I'm trying!

Seriously, I'm trying clipless pedals for the first time tonight so if anyone has any tips on not breaking my butt every five minutes, I would appreciate it. I'm also looking for a nice group to ride with who might be willing to help me learn how to ride better, and help me pick the right equipment for both budget and performance.

It's nice to meet everyone and I hope that I can meet and ride with some more experienced folks in Katy soon!

SpiderMike

Welcome. As for the clipless, you'll get use to it. Just remember to unclip before you stop. And if you do fall over at the red light, follow these steps...

1. Get up and collect yourself
2. Move to the side of the road quickly.
3. Start looking at your pedals and bike.

Following these steps will help make you look like your trying to figure out the mechanical issue that prevented you from keeping upright.

aggie_grad

Welcome to the club. I am also located in Katy. It's a great place to ride. I sometimes ride with the Bikebarn group. It's usually large so they break it up into 3 groups of 20 or so. Someone will stay back with the slowest so nobody is left out there. Check out this site to see which route is featured each week. I ride with them when it is me or me and my son. If my daughter and wife come we usually ride alone. Look at the website to see all the good routes in the area.
https://bikebarn.com/page.cfm?pageID=66

Let me know if you have any more questions or want to ride sometime. I am in Nottingham Country.

Aggie_grad

dr. nate

I as well as Chevy42083, Teeleton, and another friend of ours ride out in the Katy area. Also, be sure to check out the Free Agent Ride threads in this section.

-Nate

cycledorchy

thanks everyone for the replies. I have been over to bike barn a bunch recently, I often stop in there on my weekend rides as i live about 10 miles from the store and it's often a midpoint on my 20 mile loop.

by the way, I rode 15 miles last night on my new clipless pedals and never fell once. My strategy was to unclip my left foot for stop lights and stop signs which worked out fine. I was amazed at how much more efficient it was to pedal clicked in than with old platforms or even straps or clips.

I hope see you all on a ride in the near future! :-)

George

I live in Katy as well and I don't know if there is a better place to ride. I know there is , but it sure is nice here.

chevy42083

Katy here also.... actually Nottingham.
I've been on a couple group rides with Bicycle World and fitness (memorial and Dairy Ashford)... smaller than bike barn groups. Some pretty nice and helpful guys. We've seen the bike barn groups on the road, but I've never ridden with them.... probably should give it a shot sometime.

Nate, Teeleton, another, and I often do night rides in Katy. Usually hammer out 20ish miles at a quick pace. Haven't looked at our averages lately though... and as nate said... we usually try to do a Free Agent ride once a month.

brad06ag

West Houston here, so almost Katy.

If you want a good 20+ mile ride you can hop on the bike path in barker reservoir at fry road and ride to hwy 6 on a bike path for a little of 20 mile out and back, or you could take the path all the way to Beltway 8.

chevy42083

Yeah, that path starts at Fry and Highland knolls. Dumps you out on a 2 lane black top road which you take several hundred feet to a police station where you grab the trail headed east.

Not suggested for high speed, large groups, or at high traffic times though Atleast in my opinion... but it does make a nice cruise through the trees for summer

cycledorchy

hey I should try that; I've been meaning to branch out and not just ride along cinco ranch and westheimer and mason over and over. I tend to take cinco ranch east to westheimer, then left (north) up westheimer to katy flewellyn and then up towards katy mills, then kingsland over to mason, mason south to fry, then fry back to katy gaston and then home. It's such a nice area to ride in when the weather is clear. I can't wait to get a decent road bike so I can really open up! My current cheapo POS bike is showing it's limitations increasingly.

Hope to see you all on the road !

bluebottle1

Nowhere near Katy, myself (Heights area, just off the north loop), but I often wind up out in that direction. Echo SpiderMike's advice re clipless pedals. You'll wind up falling over at some point. I think everyone does. From what I can tell, the one hard and fast rule is that it will inevitably happen in front of the largest group of people possible.

Good luck getting started as a roadie. Roadies do tend to dominate in this part of the country, so it makes sense to go that direction. We're not exactly flush with mountains.