Old man's vest
[ posted by phill Sunday, April 10, 2005 ]

Thanks to Iain for inviting me to contribute to the blog. I may have the answer to his clothing dilemmas - an old man's string vest!
It's quite warm over here in Italy at the moment, well at least it has been for the last month or so, today it's snowing on the hills, anyway the problem is that I tend to get very hot slogging up a climb for an hour then freeze sitting immobile on the bike for 1/2h of descending.
I saw some of the pros using this garment on TV so I thought I'd give it a go and despite being the most unattractive piece of clothing you could imagine it really works. At this time of year for ambient temperatures of around 10-20C I usually have the string vest, jersey, arm and leg warmers and a gilet, then for descending a lightweight windproof and thin hat that fits under the helmet. This combination generally covers all eventualities.
So go out and get a string vest, just don't *ever* be tempted to use it without a jersey over the top, it's a big fashion NO in any country (apart from maybe Australia).