You know your bike shorts suck when...

You know your bike shorts suck when you're more comfortable riding in a skirt.

My outfit for my ride yesterday.  Kind of stylish, but not very  serious looking.

I suffer from a complex that a lot of overweight people do.  I refuse to spend significant money on clothes, because I don't want to wear that size, and I plan to shrink out of it.  Because of that, I only have one pair of cycling shorts, and they are cheap ones from MEC.  Now, they aren't horrible, and with the use of chamois butter, I've been okay going for rides as long as three hours.  Having said that, they aren't great either.

Yesterday morning, I realized that I had not washed said shorts.  I had a ride planned for the afternoon, so even if I washed them, they wouldn't be dry in time, since they don't go in the dryer and the chamois takes a while to dry.  I had a few choices: I could wear my shorts dirty, I could wear my tri shorts, or I could wear my cycling skirt, which I had bought for casual rides on my hybrid with the kids.

My last ride had been a 3 hour one, so the idea of re-wearing those shorts wasn't appealing.  I've decided I don't like my tri shorts, as they are too short, have no grippers, and ride up (I'll be getting new tri shorts this season).  So, that left me with the option of wearing my skirt (which does have bike shorts underneath).

And, it was way more comfortable then my regular shorts.  The chamois was much softer, and didn't annoy me as much.  I will admit that the skirt flapping in the wind was annoying, so I won't do it regularly, but it was a very good lesson that there are different qualities of bike shorts and I might want to upgrade, particularly as my long rides continue to get longer.

Now, since I've been getting delinquent in posting pictures lately, here's one from yesterday's ride:

The clouds look pretty cool.  I was afraid I'd get rained on even though the weather forecast said no rain.  I was glad to find out that the forecaster was right that time.