Originally Posted by
alan s
It's counterintuitive until you try it, but the best thing to do with most puddles is ride right through the middle of them slowly. This keeps you out of the squishy stuff on the sides and keeps your tires fairly clean. Obviously slow down, but the puddles are only a couple inches deep (most of them anyways) and there is plenty of traction underneath them. Another plus to riding through the puddles is you don't have to turn, so you just let your momentum carry you through.
Fully agree for the C&O. Even though it had rained for several days before I rode it, the ground under the puddles was quite solid and hard packed. I started trying to ride around the puddles more to keep my feet drier than for any other reason, once my feet were soaked, I just rode thru the puddles. GAP might be a bit softer, so that might have more mud?
Originally Posted by
biknbrian
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On the C&O there are areas of exposed dirt and small mudholes that you can come up on pretty quick. We were both using aero bars at times (highly recommended on long, flat tours). Imagine coming up on a mud hole at 15 mph on a heavy, slick tired touring bike while down in the aerobars. You can either hit the water full on, or hurry up and try to skirt around the hardpack and sloped puddle edge. You have about 2 seconds to make a decision and commit to the line.
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I would never use time trial type bars (I assume that is the type of aero bars referenced) for loaded touring. For those that do it and feel that they can maintain an adequate margin of safety while riding, when you loose control and crash please do not take me out with you. I will use the drops on drop bars to try to cut the head winds better, but never anything that offers less control than that when carrying a load on the bike.