Cycling in the wind

[Ming the Merciless]

Going to be windy tonight on our club outing. What's the windiest it can get before you decide not to bike?

 

[ianrauk]

There's not been a wind strong enough in the South East to have ever stopped me commuting. However if on a leisure ride it's looking particularly bad then I may wuss out.

This evening's commute was a right bleeding windy one.

 

[screenman]

In the past I have been down to 4mph working hard into the wind, never again. Mind you my average is only 17mph on rides nowadays so maybe it was not that bad.

If the tree in the back garden is moving about scarily I go on the turbo, that is the best I can give you, sorry.

 

[Bazzer]

I don't think I have ever looked at the wind speed when commuting
Was out in the last but one named storm in the teeth of it. That was hard work as a solo rider.
For leisure rides I tend to listen to the wind as it hits the house and decide on that basis.

 

[Dave Davenport]

It was pretty breezy on the club run today but we made sure we had a tailwind home after the cafe stop.

 

[GuyBoden]

Yes, it was windy this afternoon on the bike in the North West, but not too bad.

 

[Salty seadog]

Yet again it's us southern softies breaking up the wind before it gets to you. No need to thank us.

 

[Ming the Merciless]

You are breaking wind you say?

 

[Thorn Sherpa]

I hate riding in the wind, especially cross winds when your on open stretches. I wouldn't head out for the sake of having a ride if the winds were bad but commuted to work numerous times swearing and cursing at the elements

 

[Slick]

Another wind hater here, doesn't bother me how wet it gets but a strong wind sends me back to bed for another hour.

 

[Thorn Sherpa]

Same here give me torrential rain or snow but no wind please

 

[Ming the Merciless]

Might get both torrential wind and rain tonight. Hope pub stop has a fire going.

 

[rivers]

I tend to avoid high winds, anything over 25mph really. Neither of my bikes are particularly heavy (7kg and 9.5kg ish it's respectively), and neither am I (58kgs ish), so I tend to get tossed around by the winds. The route my commute takes means I'm going to get a bit of tailwind, headwind, and crosswinds, and is pretty open, so no shelter from buildings. There are also lots of trees, so don't really fancy a flying branch or several.
So today, I gave the bike a miss and took the bus

 

[Fenrider]

As a point of interest, you can find previous discussion on this topic here: https://www.cyclechat.net/threads/when-is-a-wind-too-much-wind.217314/

 

[NorthernDave]

Last month I binned a ride off with the average wind speed given as 24mph with gusting to 40mph.
After about the 4th or 5th unplanned and totally uncontrollable direction change I decided my safety was more important and turned for home - which meant a mile cycling straight into the wind on the flat where I ended up doing 5.2mph, which even by my standards is painfully slow.