Finally completed an Audax ride!
2 years ago, I entered a 100k Audax (http://www.aukweb.net) in February. It was sleeting, snowing abit and generally wet ant cold. I had shorts and had for some reason chosen to lose my overshoes at home. 25 miles in my feet had frozen and I gave up.
This year, having invested heavily in quality wet weather cycling clothing, I devised a 200km DIY Audax, to be done in mid February. Cue several inches of snow overnight. I know proper Audax riders would have done it anyway, but I’m chicken for slippy conditions on a bike, so fail number 2.
Yesterday, seeing a good forecast for today, I devised another 100kn DIY Audax and actually finished it!
http://connect.garmin.com/activity/150831518
Ok, the weather tried to get me again, it was zero degrees for the first 20km, but I now have good clothes (and wore my overshoes) and had organised mostly main roads so I din’t have to worry much about ice.
The magic clothes:
- Gore bike thermal bib tights
- DHB high viz base layer (http://www.wiggle.co.uk/dhb-corefit-long-sleeve-hi-viz-base-layer/)
- High viz cycling top
- Specialized jacket (which I didn’t wear, though I wish I had for the first few miles)
- Buff polar
- Specialized overshoes
- Sealskinz socks
- Sealskinz gloves (on the edge of being too cold, but I had some Pearl Izumi lobster mits as backups)