Across Canada by Bicycle

What to Wear

One of the biggest challenges that I had when planning my tour across Canada in 2002 was what I should wear during my trip. From my research I learned that I should look for breathable clothing that wouldn't hold water (sweat) to the skin. At the local Mountain Equipment Coop I bought a yellow cycling jersey, a yellow rain shell (cycling jacket), some neoprene cycling booties, a pair of cycling cleats and a set of waterproof cycling/track pants. The jersey was an excellent purchase as it dried out very quickly after becoming wet. It had long back like all cycling jerserys to protect the lower back from exposure to the elements while cycling. Also, like most if not all cycling jerseys, the back had several fairly deep pockets for storing items such as wallets and music players (radios/mp3 players/etc). I chose a yellow jersey because I felt it would be most visible on the road. I should also not that I only brought one jersey with my on the trip due to budget constraints.

The cycling pants were only used once during the entire trip. During my second day of cycling, I was rained on by some very ominous clouds. Being inexperienced at the time, I though that the pants would make the cycling more comfortable. I couldn't have been more out to lunch. Like most (all) waterproof clothing the pants were not very breathable (even that gortex nonsense). What this meant, was that as I excerted myself by biking down the road, the sweat that I generated had no real effective mechanism for escape. After some time of this, I ended up being wetter, inside the pants than I was on the outside. I took them off and never wore them again (except when I go skiing these days).

The cycling jacket suffered from much the same problem as the pants and I rarely wore it. I did wear it a number of times on the east coast where the winds and rains from the atlantic ocean would drop on me and freeze me to the bone. One thing I will say for the cycling jacket/shell was that it was a very good wind-breaker.

The booties were also used only rarely. They were meant to keep my feet dry in rain or warm in the cold. I think that the booties would be a lot more useful in the cold than they were during the rain. I found a better solution was to simply keep a pair of socks dry for when I was finished biking for the day. This ended up to be far more comfortable anyways. The booties themselves have an area on the bottom where you are supposed to cut a small hole out of the rubber so that you can continue to use the clipless pedals on your bike with your cleats.

My cycling cleats were invaluable. Because of their solid base, they allowed me to push down evenly with all the entire surface of my foot, rather than just the ball. I attached the clips for the clipless pedals to the bottom of the cleats and through the combination of these was able to travel much more efficiently than I would have if I had just had regular pedals with no cleats.

Mostly I found that water proof clothing was stupid and a waste of money. Don't buy any.