Wettest Ride Of My Life

I ref HS football and generally have about an hour commute to get to the fields on Thursday and Friday nights.  I've only taken my suburban once all season because I would rather load up and take the VFR.  Who wouldnt, right??
 
So yesterday they had been calling for rain all day, but nothing happened.  I grabbed my stuff, loaded up the bike, and headed out for Senatobia, MS.  Below is a summary of my ride, based on the first 18 minutes that I was rolling video.  
 
I've never ridden in wind so strong, or rain so heavy.  VFR was totally planted and did great.  
 
I can never remember how to embed youtube vids here... :(
 
[video: https://youtube.com/embed/J3kJx48iN4c?html5=1&fs=1]

Your    SAFE       !!!!!

Just went through something similar on our Yosemite trip. We were thinking maybe 15 minutes of rain or maybe little pockets of rain here and there, not an hour and a half of it! Glad you made home, albeit soaked, but home none the less. I think more and more of us are finding the need to have Frogg Toggs with us when we ride now. Being it is getting closer to winter may be a factor but the weather across the globe seems to be getting out of whack lately!

Safe and sound. Plus temps were still in the upper 80's so I wasn't cold.

Tonight I'll ride again, no rain but temps are dropping to the 40's!!! Time to layer up.

It will get really silly if you feel the bow wave of your front wheel slosh over your boots.......

(did that when Doubled from Canada paid me a short visit and we rode to Kinderdijk)

[image: double1_zps9fc68242.jpg]

The most I became wet on a bike was on my way home from work at night. It had been raining none stop for a week or so. I came over the bridge on my little scooter but didn't see the road was flooded, I hit the flood at 35mph and ended up sat in the ditch with water up to my waist!

I had a pretty miserable couple days during my tour around Lake Superior last year.  It was July, so thankfully it wasn't cold, but I rode through rain for parts of three days, including something like three straight hours one of those days.  I didn't even want to leave the hotel one morning, but there was no let-up in sight, so I went out and rode another couple hours in it.  It didn't help that my rainsuit leaked and my Goretex gloves didn't work either.  :sad:

Riding in a steady rain is very mentally fatiguing.  Physically, too, as you try to maintain the best possible line to avoid hydroplaning.  It was also frustrating not having any way to effectively dry my riding gear and clothes at most of the placed I stayed.

Glad you made it through that nasty commute.  Bonus points for you for riding through the rain!

I remember when I was in High School and I rode to school on my XL125, in the morning is was dry and no signs of rain, then during lunch time the clouds starting forming and by dismal time it was coming down in buckets. Of course I had no rain gear but figured I was only 4 miles from home how wet can one get?! Well I certainly found out but since I was already wet and it wasn't that cold, I decided to have some fun on the way home. While riding on one side street, the center of the street had a 'V' shaped water channel that led to some storm drains, so I stuck my foot out and placed my heel into the water and watched the water spray fly! Well, I did this a few of times until the one time when I was about to pull my foot back up, the tip of my boot went into the water and then I nearly kicked myself in the back of the head with my heal! Needless to say, that was the last time I stuck my foot into the water channel. It was fun at first, but I cut my losses at that point.

I think the poor visibility is the worst thing.

Fog is the worst, but rain is no fun either.

Well, thanks for the reminder. Ridding in a downpour sucks! Riding wet roads just makes you a better rider, purely a Darwinian response. You survive, you get to mate...