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Aug 28, 2012
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. . . Very cold - could not get my legs warm. . . .

Short version: Long pants (not skintight): any suggestions?

A year or so back I bought Uniqlo tights. They were packaged like an "energy" gel or similar and seemed no better at warming my legs, but they only cost maybe five times as much as an energy gel so I'm not complaining. Recently I bought a pair of Mizuno tights (a bit thicker). The pair cost perhaps forty times as much as much as an energy gel but today I wore them for the first time and found that they are no better at warming my legs. They're so uncomfortable that I guess they're good at averting deep-vein thrombosis, and they have wavy white lines on them: I can't think of any other pluses.

I learn here that what I need are Rapha merino wool this 'n' that. I looked at the prices. Howls of derisive laughter.

I've had it with skintight. I guess it's a good idea aerodynamically, but I'm slow so this doesn't matter. I'm thinking of legwear with space inside, or outers. Right now I don't have any. Maybe a good outer would work with good old scratchy wool momohiki, or no-name merino stuff. (Who knows, I might even spring for "Rapha".) Anyway, I want, um, overpants or anyway what might go on top of a "base layer" and extend from waist to ankle. But what I've seen in stores and on the web has had silly sizing, basically "S", "M", "L", etc. When I order jeans and the like from the US, it's simple: if waist and inseam are both 32, it fits; with these cycling versions my choices are usually (A) "pretty much OK waist and bum, too short" and (B) "pretty much the right length, I'd need to gobble chanko-nabe every day for two months". Somewhere there must be a company that isn't inspired by matryoshka dolls when deciding on sizes; but when I use "cycling long pants" or similar to look on the web for alternative brands, I'm flooded with info for skintight this and that. Anyone know of a brand of good value non-skintight long pants that come in an intelligent array of sizes?
 
Cycling specific stuff probably isn't the way to go.
I love Montbell's wool long underwear. It's relatively cheap, warm, comfortable and definitely not skintight. I wear it under a pair of Montbell hiking not so short-shorts. Works for me all winter long.
I swear I don't work for Montbell.
 
Strap a sh1t ton of energy gels together wrap em round your pegs and be done with it.

DHB does quality products as do many retailers from the sheep isle of New Zealand. Google is your friend:shutup:
 
In winter I normally wear fleece lined bib, long leg shorts under neath normal bib shorts. They are fine with any temp (raced in UK MTB event at minus 11 deg C once). But today only used leg warmers and normal bib shorts.... Thought I would warm up but didn't
 
Strap a sh1t ton of energy gels together wrap em round your pegs and be done with it.

Like!

DHB does quality products as do many retailers from the sheep isle of New Zealand. Google is your friend:shutup:

Google friendlily takes me to lots of adverts for skintight stuff. "Ranchsliders" [huh?] from Sheepland look good, but the sizing is matryoshka-inspired. Thank you for the DHB tip, though: I'll follow it up a bit later.

But today only used leg warmers and normal bib shorts....

"Warmers" fall down my puny limbs. I suppose what I need is . . . Charles Atlas!

Charles-Atlas-Mac-300x242.jpg
 
I second Montbell goods. What about the trousers used for trekking? Along with long underwear, it might be even too warm with exertion. You could also get those trousers tailored to let you get an L or XL to get the length but tighten up the waist area.

Today's commute started off at 5dC. I used mountain bike pants and while cold for the first few minutes, was fine for the rest of the commute. No long underwear or long tights... When it drops to near 0dC, I'll have some light weight tights on with the mountain bike pants.
 
Thank you, all.

I routinely (eg for today's commute) wear pants designed for trekking, but they're too loose below the knee and so I roll them up. Whereupon they're no longer long pants, of course. Hmm, perhaps I could even attach snap fasteners (press studs) myself. (Wot, me do something practical?)

I'd naively forgotten the bit about how clothes clearly described as having one size can turn out to have quite a different size. I'll have to bear that in mind, of course. Luckily lots of sites have customer feedback and I can get an idea from this. (It would be good, though, if other companies took TCC's lead and just described the sizes as they actually are, in centimetres, leaving people to figure out for themselves whether or not they fit. A bit tricky for skintight stretchy stuff, of course....)

Bit of a rush till tomorrow evening (most likely) or possibly this evening; but I'll then investigate DHB, Mont Bell, and Enduro (in no particular order).
 
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but they're too loose below the knee and so I roll them up

Try gathering the material with those elastic garters from the 100 yen store that prevent your pant cuff from getting chewed by the chain.
 
Try gathering the material with those elastic garters from the 100 yen store that prevent your pant cuff from getting chewed by the chain.

Yes, I've tried those in the past. They're designed for short trips; for longer ones, they tend to be pretty irritating, one way or another.

Thank you, @leicaman and @AlanW ! That's more for my browsing pleasure -- but after I've got a little pile of work out of the way.
 
This might not be quite what you're looking for but Swrve (http://swrve.myshopify.com) make excellent casual cycling duds. I have a couple of pairs and love them - in fact I wear them pretty much every day when commuting during the colder months. The fit is spot on and after 18 months of use they're still looking good.
 
I've lost the link, but last year I got some pants from uniqlo. They're a light fleece with a nylon shell, Might have been 2000 yen or so. I only used them a time or two but they (or something similar) might reappear.

"Double-bagging" is another option. Wear your usual shorts/tights and put something over them. For the "something over" you're welcome to imagine and experiment with what might be best. Something like the above, or a second pair of unpadded tights.

Given that it might be your frontal privates that are chilly, you need to stuff something in there to block the wind. It could be a buff, a plastic bag from a combini, etc. A little wind protection can work wonders.
 
For my recent midnight practice runs I've been wearing Uniqlo long undies under a standard pair of hiking shorts. Warmthwise, the camels (ラクダ)are sufficient while I'm moving (down to recent temps of 4-5°C), but I don't like the way the seams of the shorts press on my sensitive junk, so just this week I ordered a relatively cheap pair of gel-padded cycling undershorts (http://www.amazon.co.jp/gp/product/B00JKCIGHI/ref=od_img_link_refresh_T1). Haven't had a chance to try them yet, but I'm going to have to wear something other than the standard hiking shorts over them. Still trying to figure that one out.

Edit: sorry, the logic of the above wasn't exactly crystaline. What I meant to say is, I first thought about wearing the gel undershorts under my hiking pants, but based on visual estimation, I think the thickness of the gel will prohibit my wearing the hiking shorts over them.
 
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