ton wrote: ↑Tue Mar 10, 2020 11:19 am
I am sick to the back teeth of the wind and rain.
I have never worn waterproofs as much as I have this year.
proper doing my head in.
I know, chuffin' awful year weatherwise so far.
Better weight than wisdom, a traveller cannot carry
I can't imagine anyone's enjoying it. It kind of makes you feel like you're waiting for the year to start, yet we're nearly a quarter through it. I just console myself with the fact I'm not one of the unfortunate souls who got flooded or are going to.
Yeah pretty tired of it. Went out off road again at the weekend and the number of vaguely ride-able or enjoyable sections are very small, and fed up of the slop and muck. Decided i'll stick to back road riding for a couple of weeks, as the ground needs to recover and the water needs to recede a lot more, in order for it to be a pleasant ride. It's slowly getting warmer and lighter, annoyed i can't make the most of it.
It was a record terrible February though, with the UK as a whole having over 230% of the average rainfall. Agree with sentiments above, my gripes are nowt compared to those flooded out...
Switched jobs in December, so went from working indoors 9-5 with a bike commute each way to working outdoors 8-4 5 days/week and commuting in my van. I’ve been considerably less wet this year despite working outdoors than any other year, can count on one one the days I’ve been soaked.
I no longer have a tent, the last big storm through killed it don’t think I’ve had a dry Bivvy since at least before the winter Bivvy. Thinking of heading for one of Wales’s finest bothys for my March BAM, as long as they are not full of people hiding from the virus
It's not so much the weather that's been annoying, as it is the ability of the local bridleways and bridleways to dry out. Too many sectors have at least one 50 metre plus stretch that is ankle deep unrideable slop. Fed up of me and the bike being so clarty that I can't clip in, or turn the wheels. The joys of clay over chalk...
When we were members of Holmfirth Cycle Club, I ordered 2 sets of club kit. 1 was lycra shorts and short sleeve top, the other was Roubaix longs and thermal jacket for the other 11 months of the year.
Sorry to rub it in but it hasn't rained properly here since the end of January when storm Gloria blew through and caused a storm surge that damaged the rice fields on the Ebro Delta and flooded many dry river beds that had been that way for generations.
I was out on Sunday training for the Spanish Divide trip that is in 4 weeks and although it was chilly at 8am when I set off, by lunchtime it was in the early 20's. I've been keeping an eye on sections of the route which can be snowy due to being over 2,000m but there's been very little this year, most of the ski stations around Teruel have had to make artificial snow.
Just a reminder that we are happy to welcome visitors at our b&b and last time I looked, flights to Reus from Manchester were €19.99.
From my perspective It doesn't seem to be much different from any other year. We'd have liked the early snow to have stayed around, the "named" storms didn't amount to anything other than normal weather and, yes, the tracks are a bit manky. Around this time of year, the days get noticeably longer so I do get a bit frustrated that it hasn't warmed/dried up as much as I'd like.
I'm in North Norfolk where the lack of elevation means we get some great headwinds, and we don't have the slopes for the water falling on the fields to really drain away other than drainage ditches, and they've been full for months, so now it just runs down the roads. Seem to be cycling in a constant quagmire. Cycling is mostly riding big gravel tyres but on the road, try riding with road tyres and the little bits of flint here just cause puncture after puncture.
First event of the year was a local off road 60 miler, no brake pads after first 20 miles and even the discs were so warn they warped. Hope BB was destroyed too. Trouble is we've not had any truly cold weather either where you could enjoy hard frozen ground.
The weather and this year, started off with an eye infection, then a back injury, throw the weather into the mix and I have hardly ridden. it is starting to impact on my head space.
Simon K
There is only one God.......GODZILLA! And he rides a fat bike.
Fat cyclist, fat bike rider, bike packer, photographer, coffee junkie. Brain tumour survivor.
All my usual off road routes are either mudfests or have turned into a sandy grinding paste that eats brake pads and drive trains. The roads are full of pot holes or deep puddles with the occasional pot hole hiding in the bottom of a deep puddle.
i have done ok getting out, up to a 950 miles for the year. just very wet windy miles.
in all the years i have ridden, this has been the wetest and windiest.
roll on our summer week.................
I could do with the wind dying down as I've had a drone for over 3 weeks and I'm itching to take it up into the hills of Snowdonia for some altitude footage!
Nah it's just weather, in all its rich and varied majesty. What I would be fed up with is if it was the same all the time. Like Paul I'm not entirely enamoured with mudfests but that's 'surface' not 'weather'.
[with the right gear] 'SBS'......
Reg The Rain God (*)
(*) so it's probably all my fault. Sorry (**).
(**) not really .
Last edited by RIP on Tue Mar 10, 2020 7:30 pm, edited 1 time in total.
"My God, Ponsonby, I'm two-thirds of the way to the grave and what have I done?" - RIP
The sign outside the asylum is the wrong way round.....
Hill walking and running are good options for when the weather is rubbish, seem to get less wet doing these options and it still gets you into the countryside