How to keep people cycling through the winter

[GrasB]

You feel cold?.. you're not trying hard enough. I doubt you'll get people like me who sees the rain or snow out side & grabs a map to work out which off-road routes I can throw my hard-tail down.

Seriously, best thing to do is get people on utilitarian runs rather than leisure runs. People either work out they don't mind it enough to stop cycling or hate it. Thing is, some people will simply hate cycling in bad weather & trying to persuade them otherwise will just kill their summer enthusiasm. Surly it's better to have committed fair weather cyclists than demotivated all weather cyclists who throw in the can?

 

[ufkacbln]

The thing is common sense.... I have a recumbent trike which I use when there is a real chance I would not cycle otherwise.

If it is icy then you have to judge for yourself and that is the difficulty. Unless you do the miles you will never know what your safety limits are.

 

[skrx]

I only started cycling to work on 1st January, so I've done half a winter.

I discovered in February that it's no problem cycling on fresh snow, but compacted snow/ice is dangerous! I got off and tried to walk, but that was more difficult, so I went directly to the nearest A-road and took A-roads all the way to work. Only two car-widths of road was gritted, which generally didn't include the cycle lanes, but the cars were going slowly anyway so it was irrelevant.

I thought it was great fun, but those of you further north who get this weather more than once a decade might not agree.

Clothing -- I have a windproof cycling jacket, which is really good. I have some £1 Asda gloves, which are OK unless they get wet. Other than that, I wear my normal clothes (jeans and a t-shirt and/or long-sleeved t-shirt).
I had wet legs a couple of times, so I think I'll buy something to keep them dry -- and hopefully to stop water running into my shoes too!

 

[al78]

Take away there cars!!!


You say you don't want to use loads of base layers!!! How else are cyclists going to keep warm????

By cycling. Once you have warmed up it is trivially easy to stay warm with only modest amounts of clothing. I manage with long trousers, a t shirt and a cycling jacket for all but the coldest winter mornings. That's only two layers.

 

[bonj2]

The only way in which I have a problem with cold is my feet - everything else I can keep warm by having the right layers, gloves, even balaclava - but I've tried everything to keep my feet warm but anything below about 2 or 3 deg. c and they're still cold after about 10 miles. I think when it's that cold i'll just play more squash and go swimming more.