At some point in the history of humanity, someone thought, “What we need to put on for maximum bike riding enjoyment is like a sausage casing, but with pockets.” And thus was the cycling jersey born. The original jerseys were even made from pig and sheep’s bladders, but those didn’t breathe very well, so scientists made spandex.
Did you know that spandex is just an anagram of ‘expands?’ That’s true. You can look it up.
Cycling jerseys need to expand, because that’s also a thing a lot of human people do. We should be subsisting on leafy greens and acai berries, but Oreos and steak taste way better, although not together (Nice try, Applebees!). Of course, some people are just large by virtue of genetics. Jersey designers seem possibly never to have met any of them. What can you expect from a cohort who thinks bike riders belong in sausage casings?
One of the justifications for the sausage-ification of bicyclists is aerodynamics. Ideally, a bike jersey eliminates any vestige of flapping fabric, which is usually the big problem with why we’re so g*d-d*#ned slow. Obviously, it’s the fabric and nothing to do with our over-taxed hearts or underdeveloped legs.
The logical conclusion of this aerodynamic pursuit would be to wear no jersey at all, to wax our torsos, and then to apply some thin coating of oil or wax, not unlike the treatment you give your chain if you’re that kind of person. That would just leave the problem of pockets to be solved, but a sort of tri-part fanny pack would do the trick. Somebody get Patagonia on the phone!
I suppose the larger question is: How did we get here? Professional racers kicked off the process, which makes some modicum of sense given that their riding is often parsed by the second or fraction thereof. And then, like so many overgrown children, we all decided we needed to look like professionals. A cycling jersey is kinda like a Batman cape with pockets, which, come to think of it…
It’s at this point that I should acknowledge what you all ought to have grokked from the opening paragraph, that I craft each of these Useless Reviews with my tongue buried in my cheek. In fact, it’s a shame I don’t have two tongues, so I can’t plant one in each cheek.
Like you, I have a drawer full of jerseys, although I seem to wear them less than I used to. Is it a creeping awareness that a lot of times I don’t really need them? Is it a growing self-consciousness about my aging body? Or is it just that I take myself less seriously than I used to? Yes. Probably yes, yes, and yes.
But there are certainly days when a biking leotard is the right garment for the job, and on those days, I sift through my collection, pick out one that hasn’t absorbed too much of my bodily aroma already, and zip it up, like a crime fighter getting ready to slip into the shadows of the urban night.
Given I recently finished seventy laps around the sun, my collection of bike jerseys is more a reflection of how long (late seventies) and where (Long Island, Honolulu, and New Mexico) I have been riding rather than a reflection of what a spent geezer should wear on a bicycle. But I suppose I have finally grown into the Old Guys Who Get Fat In Winter Racing Team jerseys. Emphasis on old and fat in winter, of course. And a hat tip to pen pal Patrick O’Grady for coming up with the perfect logo for someone like me.
And then there are the two, 40 year old Protogs wool jerseys that have weathered the tests of time. I suppose being able to still ride at my age beats being dead.