Hi guys…anyone out there? Things are sort of quiet on the blog these days which makes me wonder….are you all still dieting? Remember only a few more months.
Some good news. My husband and I just got a tandem bike. The bad news…cycling apparel. For those of you unfamiliar with cycling shorts they are every girl’s fashion nemesis. The good news, I don’t have to spend anytime in a dressing room trying on cycling shorts like I did last year thanks to TGAAD. I will blaze forward in the same bad, unattractive shorts I wore last year. Which brings up a scary topic. Trying on bike shorts. If you haven’t done it don’t. It’s enough to make a girl give up on the sport. See my post from last Spring when I found myself in the same situation. Unfortuantely I was still shopping…
June 2009 (pre TGAAD)
I have recently and reluctantly re-taken up cycling, I guess you could call it recycling. I say reluctantly not because I don’t enjoy cycling or its benefits—forty miles equals a monster sized burrito and a frothy Hefferweizen. I say reluctantly because the clothes SUCK. I am being kind when I say that no one, not even Mark, my handsome, 2% body fat husband looks good in the stuff.
My re-entry into the sport began last spring when Mark talked me into upgrading my old, Raleigh ten speed to a fancy, schmancy, carbon fiber, eighteen speed something or other, with clip-in pedals. He said the upgrade was for me but I really think the old red Raleigh along side his pimped-out racing bike embarrassed him. My new bike, donned with all the components and the aero dynamic seat that is sure to give me hemorrhoids, is something he can stand by with pride. My outfit? Not so much. Upon completing the expensive bike transaction with the tattooed sales specialist, Mark insisted we stop by the apparel section of the store to check out some cycling pants. He obviously had a vision.
“Wait a minute,” I said, pausing in my tracks for effect. “Cycling pants? Are you !@#$%^ nuts? I told you I’d ride but I didn’t say I’d wear the pants. I would rather wear a pair of high waist, acid washed jeans than a pair of ugly, spandex, sausage legged shorts with a crotch chaffing, Kotex Maxi Pad chamois. It’s not my look.”
“Well then what are you going to wear?” he asked.
“My yoga pants.”
“Your yoga pants, for cycling?”
“Yeah, why not? They look so much better. You know the ones, the bell bottom lulu lemon pants with the hipster contrast border at the waist.”
“You’re not serious.”
“Yes. I am not wearing those weird pants. No way.”
I saw in his eyes his vision for our future of biking together slip away. “You can’t wear yoga pants babe. Not with your fancy new bike. It’s just not done.”
I knew then I was in over my head. This cycling business was so much more than the bike. It was a culture that demanded an aesthetic reset. I was now the proud owner of a fancy bike that required me to scrap my instinctive fashion sensibility and embrace the ugliest, most unattractive trend invented by man (a woman would know better).
And so right there in the bike store I acquiesced. I gathered six to ten pair of black cycling shorts and began the demoralizing task of squeezing my soft body into a variety of girdle like contraptions, one after the other in search of the “most flattering pair.” News flash, for those of you who have an issue with cellulite the issue becomes an all out crisis in bike shorts. I stood face to face with myself in the small, dingy fitting room and mouthed the words “you know better.”
Mark called from outside the dressing room, “hon, come out and show us.” The us included the youngish, sinewy sales woman. “Not yet,” I said, nearly out of breath and laboriously peeling off another pair of tourniquet shorts. The sales girl chimed in, “do you have a jersey?” And with that she hung three loudly colored polyester jerseys over the dressing room door. “Try these on, we just got them in. They’re awesome.” Awesome was not the word that came to mind. Logo-mad print designer on acid was more like it.
I finally settled on a pair of black, below the knee knickers with a stayfree mini-pad sized chamois. They were $90. Who knew that being unattractive could cost so much? My husband and his sales clerk side-kick were disappointed that I passed on the Jerseys. I was certain that I could get away with cycling pants and a Gap t-shirt for a while. At least until I found an inconspicuous jersey that didn’t scream “this is ugly.”
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Thanks for sharing this Sally. hiLARious!! I have never read such an apt account of the horror of bike shorts. Ugh!
Hmmm… while I definitely appreciate your humor (chuckle, chuckle) and can relate that not all cycling clothes are the most attractive, I do actually like several brands (Pearl Izumi, Sugoi, Louis Garneau, Shebeast, Craft, to name a few).
And, you can’t ride in yoga pants – pant leg in the chain will rip ‘em to shreds and the chamois is needed if you ride longer than 15 minutes. Trust me – chaffing is WAAAAAY worse than what the chamois feels like (I’ve been a cyclist for years and years now).
Plus, just think how awesome your legs will look the more you ride?
Hang in and learn to love it!
Sally, you and Mark kicked some butt out there biking this weekend. That was your first long ride and it wasn’t easy. I can’t wait to do more rides with you.
Biking shorts really are the worst for a number of reasons, butt padding (which is also a good thing), skin tight fit, black elastic next to white white skin….
I have two things to help improve the situation:
1. Tanning cream to ease the glare of my skin
2. Bike pants tha come down just above the calves…much slimmer look.
Other than that you need to get something that feels good and looks better than the others.
Here’s to biking.
Awwhahaww. I have to admit this is humorous in a kitty running into a sliding glass door kind of way. But it also just reminds me of making a sad attempt to purchase flattering swimwear. Between racks upon racks of string bikinis and loudly printed bike shorts, the stores have really got us (un)covered.
100% they saying goes like this "there are 2 kinds of riders those that have been down and those that are going down. Now not all the accidents end in death or injury but you could be pretty damn sure that if you never fell on you bike then you are going to one day. I fell or rather dumped mine my first season. I was going about 20mph and a car blew a stop sign i just laid the bike over and a slid or bounced is much more like it to a stop and i was fine, but my bicycle wasnt.
I’m struggling now with this bike pants issue, having spent the buck$ on a fully carbon bike, I cheaped out on clothes, and definitely these yoga pants aren’t working. I guess I’m going to have to spring for a more expensive pair of longer-legged shorts because after one washing, there is no way I am going to be seen in these things again. For my “hers” picture, add a 1″ bump of fat at the top of the inside of each leg :/
Oh and what’s up with Libby Anglin’s off topic scary comment?
Why do women end up with all the crappy stuff like cellulite and child birth? I wonder just how men would handle it?
I also thought this post was hilarious. I love to bike, but hate the clothes. For me, it was a purely functional decision, after many rides with a sore bum and tearing up several of my favorite yoga pants! I do wear the jerseys with the hope that the wild patterns are so distracting that no one looks down.
I discovered Harlot Wear a few years ago thanks to an article in the NY TImes and now just buy all my cycling shorts from their site. When your year of no spending is up, check them out. They’re padded but don’t make you feel like you’re wearing a diaper. And they look like normal shorts so you don’t look or feel packed into an unattractive lyrca casing. They’re pricey–between $50-100 per pair. But my oldest pair is now four years old and still wears like new.