Riding in the rain

Rain

You wake up on the day of ride, and the skies are dark, and rain is coming down. Some cyclists would rather stay inside and ride their trainer and not ride out in the rain. Others will put on their cycling kit and ride in the rain anyway. Unless the rain is a torrential downpour, you can safely ride in the rain, with changes in your approach to the ride and additional clothing.

I live in Southern California, and it does rain here during the rainy season, between November and April, most years. Just like seeing golfers out on a course during a shower, you’ll find cyclists out on the road in the rain. Rain falls on cyclists around the world. So it is common and a part of cycling.

When you look out of your window and rain is coming down, you do have to assess just how much rain is coming down and for how long. If there is a downpour, with streams of water out on the road and the idea of descending any hill makes your worry, it may be a good idea to donate the money to the organizers and ride another day. But first, you should check the weather prediction for the day. The weather may get better in a few hours. Smartphone weather apps provide a display of the upcoming weather by the hour. If better weather is only an hour or so away, you may be able to muddle through the rain until then.

Layering your Cycling Kit

You should consider adding layers to your standard cycling kit. Each extra item should be cycling related clothing. Cycling clothing tends to be light, removable on the road and stored in your jersey pockets. Throwing on a lined jacket or switching from bike shorts to ¾, or full-length cycling tights can be a real problem when the rain stops and it begins to warm up later in the day.

Underneath your jersey, you can wear a base layer. Base layers come in varying thickness, some have a thin fleece, others do not. Know what the temperature is going to be later. A fleeced base layer may be great early in the morning but can become a real pain when the sun is out, and it is 80 degrees F (27 degrees C) later in the day.

Wearing a cap underneath your helmet will help keep your body warm as well as a base layer. As your hair gets wet and the air passes through your helmet, your body will lose heat from your scalp. The cap keeps the winds from passing along your scalp and your wet hair. A classic cycling cap will do well in this situation with the small bill keeping the falling rain out of your eyes as well. I have an Under Armour Football helmet skull cap which keeps the wind out of my hair, which works for rainy as well as cold days.

For your feet, you can wear cycling overshoes on your cycling shoes. Cycling shoes are designed to allow air through the shoe to keep your feet cool on warm days. Cycling shoes have vents on either the top or sides of your shoes to let air in. Cycling overshoes are waterproof and cover your cycling shoes and socks to keep the rain and air off.

One thing to consider is to make sure that some air can flow through your cycling clothes. You cannot keep your body cool if your sweat is trapped beneath your clothes while you are riding. Remember, you are exerting yourself and sweating is the best way for your body to regulate your body temperature. You have to balance keeping the rain off of you against allowing some air to reach your body.

Last, you can switch to full finger gloves to keep your hands warm and dry. For colder days, you can use neoprene gloves. Especially if your fingers are sensitive to cold and wet weather. Neoprene is the material that in wetsuits.

Your Road Bike

If it has not rained for a long time, either weeks or months, then the roads may have a thin layer of oil that comes up at the beginning of a rain storm. At the start of a storm, pay particular attention to the road surface, especially if there is an oily sheen. As the storm progresses, the oil should move off to the gutter or roadside.

To prepare your road bicycle, you should start with reducing your tire pressure by 10 psi (.7 bar). This will increase the tire contact area on the pavement, which should reduce slipping on the wet pavement. If you are using 23mm tires, the pressure reduction will slightly increase your chance of getting a pinch flat. 25mm tires increase your road contact area and reduce the possibility of pinch flats, due to the increased internal volume in the tire. As the skies clear, you can increase the air pressure in your tires at the next rest stop, or out on the road, if you have your own tire minipump.

Car accidents in Southern California rise during rain storms. Drivers do not change their behavior to accommodate the rain. Slowing down and driving differently is lost on drivers who rarely experience rain. The same lesson applies to cyclists. You have to change the way you ride in the rain. Most importantly, you have to brake earlier than you would normally. First, your wheel rims and brake pads are wet and may not work well, or at all, when you first hit your brake levers. Aluminum wheel sets perform better than carbon fiber wheel set. The cork brake pads do not perform as well on carbon fiber brake tracks as the rubber brake pads used with aluminum rims and brake tracks. Disc brakes perform well in the rain. The braking distance is much shorter with disc brakes. This is one of the reasons why disc brakes are becoming increasingly popular on road bicycles.

While you are riding in the rain, try not to turn on the painted lines on the road as much as possible. This is especially true when you are braking as well. Crosswalks, stop lines, and other painted road lines are extremely slippery. Wet rubber tires will slip across these painted lines as if they were ice. Rubber mats that railroads are using at railroad crossings and steel plates that construction companies use with road work are equally dangerous when wet.