How winter? My favorite has been the PI insulated 3/4 bib tight. I have similar from Assos and Rapha, neither of which I like much. I wear 'em down to 9c which may not be winter enough. For colder I have some full length ones that work pretty well, also from PI.
Haven’t tried Castelli bibs in a decade, but I’m pretty fond of their ROS jersey jacket thing and some of their other inclement weather kit.
It me.
Sweden.
Yeah, 9C is where I’m at now, which is considered VERY mild for this time of year.
I’m thinking more like -10 to -15C.
I survived those temps a couple years ago in the thickest bibs I own and many layers on top, but it was miserable. My commute is about 1.5 hours in the snow. I’m just trying to be slightly more comfortable if it gets that bad again this year.
Yeah, I’m not sure. There’s these:
They claim they’re good to -10C
…and a few others Velocio Zero, Castelli Polare 3.
No personal experience with these, however and it’d be an expensive experiment.
Goddamn. Those look good, but the moneys!
Right. …and the reviews for all these are shit. Basically a regurgitation of the product details. My experiences with cold weather kit from Rapha, Assos, Castelli, and others has been entirely unreliable with regard to the reviews vs. my actual preference.
I very rarely get that cold, but I’ve found insulated tights+leg warmers gets me at least another -2 over tights alone.
I have the PI AmFib and Sportful Fiandre bib tights. The AmFib are more wind resistant, but I find the Sportful more comfortable.
I’m curious if/when Patagonia or someone similar goes HARD on cycling kit. Gorewear has done it pretty successfully (best vest I’ve ever owned, really nice cold weather tights), but Nike ate shit at it and Adidas is perpetually relaunching their cycling lines. So maybe everyone is hesitant because the market seems tough to crack, but
The garment engineering isn’t that far afield from what these companies already do, and I’d imagine that Patagonia has a pretty huge surplus of customer goodwill - people would try some thermal tights from them
FTFY
Nordic skiing checking in for market size issues
And kinda fragmented- but if you’ve got REI as your distributor channel to exactly your target market, you’d think someone would give it a go.
I’m curious if the more body-hugging fit of cycling clothing is an obstacle compared to typical outerwear.
I certainly find this to be the case with gloves. Doesn’t matter how good a company’s materials and construction are, I’m way more finicky about fit above all else.
As I understand it, most of the REI model when it comes to name-brand stuff is to leverage buying power or straight-up buying overstock to maximize profit. Maybe not the ideal channel for a premium brand to wade into an unproven segment.
Cycling clothing is a crowded market anyway. Years ago it was Pearl Izumi, and a bunch of little guys scrambling around for scraps. Now PI underperforms to the point that Shimano gave them the boot. Rapha couldn’t turn a profit despite being the most recognized brand in the industry. I’m sure Patagonia could make some truly amazing products, but selling enough to tell the factory to stop making puffy vests to wear to the brewery might be easier said than done.
I suspect that Patagonia has the supply chain reach to do both.
But yeah, fragmented market for sure.
Rapha also spent themselves into a hole with marketing. Armchair quarterbacking that: why no diffusion line in 2014 or so?
Patagonia makes mtnbro clothing. I don’t see the problem.
Bibs are for babies lol.
Anybody fuckin with that Patagonia dirt roamer jacket? I’m thinking about one for Arkansas winter commuting, i.e. usually like 40 degrees but occasionally cold as fuck.
I was hoping lululemon made some bike clothes because they’ve done the work in the spandex r&d
The Rocky Mountain Enduro team had a sponsorship with Lululemon a few years ago. I think it was mostly for their off-track adventures, though.
