"There is no bad weather."
 

"There is only bad clothes."

I'm thinking the clothes that I chose for my breakfast ride this morning weren't so good for such a cool morning.

I tend to agree, mostly. Although ask me during a ride in a hailstorm and I might reply otherwise!

Rule #9 .

That's what your helmet and beanie are for. It is spooky to ride in the car tracks with an inch of hail on either side, though. I brought a jacket I didn't think I'd need on today's ride. Needed it.

How are the fall colors on the other side of the Missississississississippippi... er... river. The bluffs on this side are starting to look pretty good along the River Road and in Pere Marquette Park.

I added a rack and trunk bag to my rain/winter bike. Being able to take along clothing "I might need". And having a place to store extra clothing I decided I don't need to wear.... is a great help. In really cold weather... I even take along hand warmers.

There is no bad weather -- indoors.

On the flip side, I pretty much won't ride over 97 or 98 in low humidity and 95 when it's humid. At those temps I keep my rides at 25 miles or so.

Heat kills.

You could make a case for clothing in cold and/or wet weather but in very hot weather there is just so much clothing you can take off! Yesterday I hit the bottom of a very tough climb with 108 miles on my legs already and 110 Deg. F at the bottom.

Thankfully, as I climbed (12 mile climb) the weather get cooler, the gentle breeze (often a tail-wind) helped cool me off too. By the summit (at Ranchita) it was a quite wonderful 88 degrees!

Rick / OCRR

If you check out my avatar you will see that I carry a pretty good sized seat back bag. As a general rule, it contains whatever would have been necessary to prepare me for the last time that I rode. Maybe I'll throw some full finger gloves in there for next time.

"There is no bad weather."

I recently replied to this Living Car Free Forum, ”How does your winter weather look?"

Like [MENTION=358443]Dave Cutter[/MENTION] posted, I have a large Ortlieb pannier on my beater mountain bike containing all my rain gear. I try never to ride my pristine CF bike in nasty weather, though cold and clean roads are fine. Two weeks ago I bought a pretty capcious seat bag the I can mount on my carbon fiber seat post, without a rear rack. In the second picture of the Bike Pack, I attached my tool bag outside to increase the capacity inside.

http://bikeforums.net/attachment.php...hmentid=484628http://bikeforums.net/attachment.php...hmentid=484629http://bikeforums.net/attachment.php...hmentid=484631

Same here. Remounted the rack and trunk bag on the bike. It has not yet gotten too cold yet in these parts but wind has begun more often blowing from the north. When it does get cold, which for me is about the freezing mark, that wind cuts like razor blades for which I carry enough extra stuff to insure I'm warm.

I would have agreed with the OP about 'no bad weather', and always thought I had a pretty thick bark that could take just about any kind of environment and still enjoy it on a bike. But then on Cycle North Carolina this year, coming down Pisgah gap near Waynesville, I started to go into hypothermia [I'm pretty sure of it anyway]. I was shaking so bad my bike was wobbling. The rain had turned into a mist you see, and the hard wind coming down the pass acted like an 'air conditioner'...and with wet roads, I couldn't peddle to keep warm [was actually braking to stay in safe speed with foggy glasses and streams rolling across the road]. But, to give OP his due, I suppose I was under dressed for how the ride turned out. I have never been so cold in my life and came ever so close to having to call in the SAG wagon for the first time 'ever'.

I guess the lesson I learned was a kind of humility. I wasn't nearly so tough as I had imagined. I'll never forget how cold I was though. Scary really. Mortal even.

Yeah, guess I might be learning about the OP's postulate myself. They say "The Boy Child" is coming and it's gonna get real this time
Picked a great time to start getting back on the road. Hello trainer?

< 50 degrees F, rainy, and windy and I'm in my basement gym on my Life Fitness stationary recumbent watching back episodes of NCIS on the flat panel. :)

Bad weather means bad driving for cars which move too fast too close here in the NE.

Bad drivers and a crash or two in wet weather means I don't ride much when it rains. I want to enjoy my rides.

Blizzard conditions=bad cycling weather.

For the uninformed, a gen-U-ine blizzard is deadly.

I'm thinking there IS such a thing as bad weather. The storms down south last night come to mind. Qcpmsame if you're there how did you 'weather' the weather?

got caught in a torrential rain storm on my bike one day, hunkered down on the side of the road until it let up cuz it occurred to me that the cars that were still driving probably wouldn't have seen me, even with my strobes

I ride two CF bikes in bad weather. But not all at once. ;) CF and bad weather go perfect together. Nothing to rust or corrode, no? Today was a good ride to NYC albeit a bit rainy. Definately can't complain about the temps lately. February this year is a cakewalk compared to last year. Last year was a bunch of small snow storms one after the other. Was off the bike for almost the entire month, if I recall. You must have been pretty hosed with all the snow up in Boston last year...

But back on topic, I agree with the OP in that the clothing choice really makes or breaks the ride in colder and/or wetter weather. I still wuss out colder than 20F and/or a lot of snow on the ground. But for the NYC area, that's only 3 to 4 weeks per year off the road give or take?

Last Feb up here on the 45th was killer. We had temps of -25 and mostly -15, like daily. One week I had the starter burn out in my work car, personal vehicle and snowblower/tractor. It was brutal.

This year has been a treat.

Wow. A helluva lot colder than my hood. Sounds like you could use an engine block heater?

Proper clothing can certainly make cycling more enjoyable in varying weather conditions. However, I don't subscribe to the view that there is no weather unsuitable for cycling. I cycle for fitness and recreation, not to prove how tough or crazy I am. Our entire state is under a tornado watch today with severe thunderstorms and high winds forecasted through the afternoon. I'm not riding in weather like this, nor when it's snowing, sleeting, hailing, tropical storming, or temperatures soaring over 100 F.

The starter froze and burned on the work car (county maintained), tractor was just flooded and the personal vehicle....that was just too old. This year all is well.