It’s that time of year…
TLDR: lights are required. You can borrow ours if you don’t have them.
You may have noticed we love an evening ride around here. Stealing some time back for yourself after work or other responsibilities is the greatest feeling. As we head towards the tail end of summer (?!) there can be dreamy sunsets that bathe familiar scenes in golden light, making the clouds look like fluffy pink marshmellows. However once the sunset is done is gets DARK and that can only mean we need lights! 🔦
Out in unlit places and with tricky surfaces sometimes under wheel your front light(s) become key in having a safe and enjoyable ride. Yes lights, plural, one for the bars and one for the helmet. Two lights are much better than one, they allow greater depth perception and the one on your head allows you to see around corners before your bars are pointing that way! Oh and 2 lights means if one breaks you’re not stuck!
There’s no streetlights where we ride either so they need to provide a fair amount of light! 💡 The amount is measured in Lumen and any good light should have this stated on the packet or in the description. 600 lumens is the minimum required but the more the better.
There is a trade off between lumen and battery time though, so lights with different settings are the best here. Then you can use the brightest setting when you really need it and lower settings for more well lit areas and smoother trails allowing you to save some of that precious battery. Again the battery time should be listed and as our evening rides are generally only a couple of hours it’s not a major issue generally but making sure they are charged is still pretty important!
We’ve rounded up a couple of our riders lights set ups to give you an idea.
Anna is a regular night rider and has therefore invested in the equipment. A huuuge exposure light on her handlebars lights the way for us all and matched up with a (?) for her helmet she’s a real lighthouse on the trails.
Sarah is less regular so has a make do setup, using a normal bar light but makes use of a head torch for the helmet! Just make sure it’s well attached and not going anywhere or it can shimmy down and bop you on your nose.
Jodie runs all moon lights, these are the same as the club ones that are available to borrow is able to give you a full run down of all the settings and best placements if you borrow the club lights.
Lisi has become an absolute convert to night riding over the past few years but not wanting to invest a tonne until she was entirely sold she’s been running a set of lights from decathlon which have held up well and done the job! She only comes out on the worst nights so we don’t have any pictures of the setup for now!
If this all feels a bit overwhelming but you want to try out riding after dark we have a couple of sets we are able to lend out for our evening rides, so don’t let lack of lights stop you joining us, just drop us a note so we can make sure they are charged up for you!
Oh a red rear light doesn’t go amiss, generally mostly required for small road sections, riding home after or providing a beacon for the rider behind you to follow.
Why’d we ride in the dark you ask? Well it’s not all doom and gloom, there’s magic waiting out in them there hills after dark, and there’s a lot less other people to avoid!