Cycling kit is really expensive, and you can sometimes feel a bit silly wearing it. So why not just wear casual clothes, or even full work attire on your commute?
This can be a very tricky choice to make when cycling to work. How far is too far for normal clothes? Will your work clothes get all sweaty? And crucially, is Lycra kit going to make you that much faster? >
Well, that’s what Dave and I wanted to find out. We headed out to Saltford, a great example of a commuter town 8.2km away from our Bath office. This, according to Strava, is the average distance of a bike commute here in the UK.
> Bike vs train vs car mega commuting race: who will win?
We would do two rides each, one in our lovely new road.cc-branded Isadore kit, and a second in typical office attire. I chose a more formal outfit, while Dave opted for a smart casual number.
Comfort
The first observation centred around on-bike comfort. I particularly found there was a lot of benefit of swapping to cycling shorts, finding the suit trousers to be far too restrictive, especially around the hips.
Dave was more comfortable in his casual office wear, but it’s safe to say that jeans are also out of place on the bike. There are, however, some good options for cycling-specific denim, so if you’re looking to wear casual clothes for your ride to work, these are worth a look.
For the 8.2km distance and, more importantly, the road bikes that we were using, cycling kit was the far more comfortable option. It is designed to be worn in a road riding position, though it must be said that similar comfort issues might not be faced when using a more upright city bike.
Weather
While the weather was relatively clement with light winds and sunshine, the 20ºC temperature still caused me to arrive very sweaty. Sitting in a sweaty suit would not be comfortable for me or anyone in my vicinity, though given a shorter commute and a more suitable bike, this would not have been an issue.
On the day we’d chosen for testing (and filming), biblical rain had been falling all morning. In these conditions, there is rarely any clothing you’d call ‘perfect’, but getting your work clothes soaked isn’t a great way to start the day. A set of waterproof over clothes is a sensible purchase for committed commuters, but any sort of exertion in these will quickly make you sweaty.
While standard Lycra is pretty useless for keeping you dry, it does at least dry quickly, meaning that once you get to work and change into work clothes, your kit stands a chance of being dry enough for your ride home.
Results
The casual commute took 23:05 with an average power of 106 watts. The second run, this time in cycling kit, took 21:05, and my average power was 117 watts.
While the second run was a little faster, much (if not all) of the time saving would be lost when getting changed out of your cycling kit and into office clothes. We’d also point out that timed testing on open city roads is far from accurate, with plenty of traffic and red lights to negatively impact the accuracy of any speed claims.
Instead, it is more useful to look at the less tangible differences. Both Dave and I were far more comfortable in cycling kit while riding, and arrived feeling far fresher. A little extra time taken to get changed was worth it for this commute.
It’s difficult to put a number on the distance where riding in normal clothes becomes uncomfortable and cycling kit should take over. Elevation and the bike you choose will likely have more of an impact than distance alone.
Both of us, however, reached one firm conclusion. For commuting, especially when hills are involved, an e-bike is what we’d choose.
