There is something supremely Fantastic about a precisely manicured set of sunglasses, particularly when they’re not being used for their intended purpose. Certainly, there are times when circumstance offer no alternative but to actually look through them, but for the most part, it’s a bit pedestrian to use sunglasses for seeing through.
I’ve been obsessed with sunglasses since I was a kid; photos of the Smallest Frank Imaginable feature sunglasses in close proximity, usually perched atop my head of wavy brown hair and rarely anywhere near my eyes. As an athlete, sunglasses have never been far adrift, whether in skiing or cycling, and – in all seriousness – for good reason: eyes are fragile things that should be protected.
Nevertheless, whenever any kind of effort is required, I quickly find myself moving the eyeglasses away from my eyes in an almost claustrophobic panic, and it wasn’t until my most recent ride up Haleakala in my 30th year of sport that the reason for this occurred to me. As athletes, we are hugely dependent on our vision to gauge our effort.
Flying by V-Meter only, our vision offers a constant feedback loop to how near the Man with the Hammer has wandered, and how sharp his blow might be. As we approach sustained effort at or above aerobic threshold, one of the early signs of Diminishing V Returns is the flushing of blood from our cheeks followed closely by the tunneling of our vision. Color is desaturated, then the sides box in a bit, then things get a bit narrow and blurry, and after that the deterioration is not normally recalled in any degree of clarity.
It struck me like a bolt from Merckx’s Crankset: when my vision starts to go, I tear away my sunglasses in order to gauge my effort without the abstraction of the lens. So long as I ride within myself, the shades happily cover my eyes; when I am at my limit, they come off and pop onto the helmet. I used to blame claustrophobia, now I realize it is a matter of gaining an unobstructed view on the V-Meter.
Vive la Vie Velominatus.
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Eyewear looks best perched on a cycling cap IMO.
I have devised a theory as to why @frank cannot find an acceptable cycling cap these days, helmets. Not to start a debate, but they don't go well together. In order to not have the helmet pushed back-up at a terrible angle, the peak of the cap must be very short, this short peak looks awful once the helmet is removed. In the old days of the cycling cap, helmets were not worn, and the leather hairnets had a higher "brim" which allowed the wearing of a proper cap while still maintaining the ability to see.
@starclimber
Mostly.
I never take my glasses off, especially when I'm on the rivet. It's like a professional poker player, I don't want people to see my eyes or else they may know how tired I am...
O, Pantani. I don't care how much Blow and EPO were in practice. You were fucking magic!!! End of story.
Rather than the onset of hypoxia, I find that the reason I want to shed my sunnies when at Vmax is so that I can gain the cooling advantage of a 12 km/h breeze on a few extra square centimetres of exposed skin/eyeball. I use untinted lenses at night to avoid the inevitable bug strikes.
Now that I need reading glasses I'm stuck with the V-Meter because I can't see the frikkin readout on my Cateye.
Map reading on the MTB is particularly hilarious if you forget to squirrel away a pair of specs.
Solutions and suggestions please...
@DerHoggz
Cycling caps had short brims in the 'old days' too, as you'll see from the various images of Merckx, de Vlaeminck etc which adorn this site.
Whether or not you wear it with a helmet irrelevant. The peak has to be short so that you can see ahead when you're riding, especially if you are in the drops. It's a perfect combination of form and function - you see just far enough ahead to be safe but not so much the the sun or rain comes through.
As for whether the short peak looks awful without the helmet, I fundamentally disagree. I think they look much better than a baseball-style cap, and terrible under a helmet - it's always wrong. See below...
Does this look awful ?
Does this look awful ?
@the Engine
Contact lenses. I'm blind as a bat so I have to ride with them to see anything past about 30cm. This makes some high quality eyewear (M-frames currently, Radars in the near future) essential to stop your lenses blowing out when going downhill. As a result the glasses stay in place unless I'm on a big climb or more commonly, unless its raining. Again. Still haven't mastered the single-handed removal and installation in helmet vents as seen in @Frank's latest video - strong work, very PRO. I'll keep practising.
My current set of cycling eyewear is photosensitive, so covers all possibilities from pitch black (before dawn) to sunny days with the snow here. I'm happy with that, but they do sometimes go in the helmet on a climb.
D.
I've touched Pantani's climbing machine from the 1998 Giro and it's pared back to the bone so as to not obstruct access to his V meter.
Front mech shifter on the downtube to slightly reduce weight; he only climbed on the big ring so didn't need it. Low saddle to bar drop to accommodate always using the drops. Every flat part drilled with holes to within an inch of collapse to reduce weight. And like the pilot the machine was also really small.
You could feel the years of hard use radiating from every component. It was definitely about the bike.