Showers Pass VelEau hydration system

Speedfils, Camelbaks, even the humble bottle – there are plenty of ways to take some water with you on your ride. West coast US cycling accessories and clothing company Showers Pass have their own suggestion to add into the mix – the VelEau 42. (Get it? Velo? But with L'eau in it! Tough crowd.)

With a capacity of about 1.2 litres, this is a shaped plastic bottle mounted behind the seat, with a tube and bite valve at the handle-bar end. The bottle lid is a large screw-cap, not dissimilar to a regular waterbottle lid. Part of the bottle assembly is a tough fabric casing that also provides a small zipped saddlebag pouch. The bottle is shaped like a large saddlebag, with the tubing at the lowest point, close to the seat post.

The tubing is intended to be run along the top-tube, and is connected to the frame with three magnetic clips. Two of these are connected with thin nylon cord to a spring that snaps the tube into place. The third is on a mid-line magnet that fixes to the top-tube via a mount held in place with O-rings. The idea is that you pull the tube to your mouth to drink and then it returns to whatever position you prefer when not using it.

In practice, this works okay; with a little tinkering the magnetic clips do their job smoothly enough. I found that the mid-line magnet wasn't all that secure, though, and the elastic O-ring that held it to the frame made an exit mid-ride not long after I'd attached it. Unfortunately the best place for it in relation to the length of the top-tube is close to where your knees are and so likely to get knocked about. The system still worked pretty well without it, though.

The fabric casing is robust and the saddlebag pouch is just about big enough for a tube. Or a repair kit/tools, but not both, unfortunately. There are no loops for attaching a light or mini-pump, which is a bit of a shame given the size of the bottle area means that there isn't much seat post, or saddle rail, available for a rear light.

Showers Pass suggest this design is suitable for all riders and cycling types – mountain bikers, leisure, road and time-trial are all suggested in the literature. Of these, I could see it being most useful for time-trialling, because it is easy to get the tube at a consistent position in front of your mouth while riding the aerobars.

The reality is that this feels like a complex solution to what is quite often an easy 'problem' to solve. For me, having odd-shaped bottles and tubing to maintain isn't going to win out over swilling a water bottle out (but then I never really got Camelbaks either, and I know plenty that swear by them). It could really work for time-trialling, but only longer distances – who would want to lug this over a 10? Conceivably this might work for longer triathlons, but then refilling would be a pain compared to a Speedfil or between-the-aerobars unit on a longer distance event.

It is an interesting idea, and executed pretty well, but I'm struggling to imagine many cyclists for whom would be the best way to carry water. This unit was partially inspired for mountain-bikers – and I'm not one. I can't imagine swapping from a back-mounted system for this as it means taking a hand off the bars, but there may be a pay-off to this that I don't appreciate. Touring cyclists might go for it, I suppose, but it's not like they're poorly-served by bottles.

I can't imagine this making to many road bikes. Practically it might work, but it just isn't a 'road' solution. The setup behind the seat is pretty chunky and all that tubing and clips would spoil many riders' view of what their ride should look like.

Verdict

Interesting idea that is well executed, but possibly a solution in search of a problem