We asked fashion blogger-star Gala Darling to give us some advice about how to dress when you’re a winter biker – and hopefully avoid looking like a stuffed sausage. She has some awesome pointers, and digs out some pretty cool helmets, backpacks and other assorted bike accouterments. Head to her site for the full post, but here’s an excerpt:

When the temperatures start to drop, the temptation is to bundle up, hail a taxi & let your bicycle collect cobwebs. The truth is, you can ride your bike almost the whole year, if you’re dressed appropriately!

Here are some items I suggest in your keeping-warm-on-the-bike arsenal…

Leather leggings

A thick scarf you can pull up over your mouth

Cashmere-lined leather gloves, or something equally decadent & cozy. P.S. I like to buy gloves from places like Century 21 or T.J. Maxx, they always have great deals!

Cashmere leggings

Merino wool layering pieces , like sweaters, turtlenecks & long tunics to keep your lower back covered!

A cute blazer (love that one, so Willy Wonka!) or jacket

A faux fur gilet

Riyoko have fleece-lined leggings in cute patterns!

Really, the trick is to wear super-warm layers. They don’t have to be thick & bulky. I love merino wool & Uniqlo’s HeatTech pieces for this purpose — they’re the thickness of a regular t-shirt but keep you really toasty. If you can keep your torso warm, you won’t need to wear a trillion layers & look like the Stay-Puft Marshmallow Man! Hooray!

You also don’t have to go out & buy all new things just to ride on your bike! One of my favourite blazers is an old velvet thing, it’s got tattered sleeves but I love it for topping off a cycling ensemble!

You might also want to check some of those shops for outdoorsy, adventure type people. I don’t really know what they’re called! However, they’re great for stocking up on thermal underthings, stuff made of Thinsulate, really warm hats, scarves, gloves, etc. They also often have “athletic” sections, so you might even find stuff made specifically for intrepid winter biking!

Image (c) A Simple Six

Image (cc) Mikael Colville-Andersen

Image (cc) Mikael Colville-Andersen

Image (cc) milknosugar

Image (cc) Mark Stosberg

Image (cc) Jeff Youngstrom

Image (cc) cleverchimp

There are more pics at Copenhagenize.

There’s even a Christmas tree company in Portland called “Trees By Bike” that, you guessed it, deliver their trees via bike (they’re already sold out for the year.)

Barring the effects of climate change, winter should have now well and truly descended wherever you are in the world. We hope you’re keeping warm and brushing away any eyelash icicles.  And you’ll be glad to hear we’re almost up to 400 challengers now.

On my ride this morning I spotted a beautiful husky going for a jog – while his owner rode alongside on a bicycle. Not sure how safe it is, but these days I’ve seen it all in Beijing’s bicycle lanes!

(Also awesome? The guy on the scooter carrying what looks like an entire pink furniture set.)

Keep sending in your photos of your rides, and we’d love to see videos too if you have them.

And have a very Merry Christmas and happy holidays! Stay tuned for more from us on the other side of the New Year

Love, Emily and Monica.

Image (cc) Express Monorail

One of our Winter B-icicle Challengers sent in a mainly positive email, but also with this to say:

I love the idea behind your winter cycling drive. More people on more bikes more often! But what is the point of pledging to ride everyday in the winter if you aren’t prepared to ride in the conditions that winter provides?

The reason I feel its important to mention this is because as a winter commuter I get asked by car drivers constantly about the conditions during my ride. All the time they are talking to me they are trying to impose a subtext to their statements that it is too dangerous to be riding a bicycle in the winter and that I should be careful so that they don’t kill me with their 2000LB vehicle.

By saying there are conditions in which it’d be so icy you’d probably break your neck continues this tradition of poo-pooing bicycles as viable means of transportation.

For all bikers encouraging friends and family members to “make the switch”, it’s important never to exaggerate the dangers of biking or cycling. It’s something we hope we haven’t done in laying out conditions for the ‘Winter B-icicle Challenge’. And it does bring up an interesting question: how far should winter bikers go?

The answer is simple, as far as you choose. The point of this challenge is to encourage more bike riding and less car riding. The further you’re willing to go with that, the better, but we realise not all challengers will go as far as others. There will be some who will ride no matter what the weather – hail, gale force winds, roads so shiny you could skate on them, and furious snowstorms. There are others, however, who won’t ride through such hairy weather, but it can still mean they’re riding almost every day of winter and many, many more days than they usually would.

On the ‘Winter B-icicle Challenge’ event page challenger Martin Elwell wrote: “There’s no such thing as bad weather, only bad clothing”. And in the same way, often riding through snow and ice is only dangerous because your bike is under-equipped. Given you have the right equipment, and right attitude, biking can be safe most places in the world and periods of the year.

In short:

1. If you are riding through less than ideal conditions, here are a few words of advice to ensure your safety.

2. On any day you choose not to ride your bike, we implore you to consider walking or catching public transport. These are much more environmentally friendly options than cars or cabs.

Image (cc) Pörrö

Today we’ve kicked off week two of the ‘Winter B-icicle Challenge’ and Em and I are super delighted to see over 200 bikers from around the world have signed up. It’s amazing to think it was just two weeks ago I read Em’s blog and saw that she had set a personal winter biking challenge for herself in an effort to commit to a green lifestyle – all year round. And later that evening I met up with her in a Beijing bar and said, “Em, you have to go big with this.”

As luck would have it Emily agreed, and within a few days we had a name (Lane Change), a site up (the one you’re reading) and thanks to the contributions of one talented bike-lovin’ graphic designer, we also had some fantastic graphics for our challenge. As for the rest, we would have to wait and see.

Safe to say it’s been amazing to see that in the last week we’ve seen our challenge spread through blogs, twitter, and mainly through facebook to all parts of the globe. Challengers hailing from London, Miami, Seattle, Boston, Syracuse, Calgary, Alaska, The Hague, Gloucestershire, Shanghai, Beijing and other cities have been sending in photos and comments.

I don’t know about you guys, but there’s something really cool – actually make that really warming – knowing every time I stick on my beanie and gloves, hop on my bike and push off, you guys are out there doing the same. That there’s 200 of us (and growing) who every morning choose to take our bike and make earth-friendly tracks all through the snow.

And just remember, every ride you make, and every day you make it – you are a biking advert for a better, cleaner, more beautiful future. Ride on!

Image: Photos sent in from challengers via. the ‘Winter B-icicle Challenge’ Facebook page. Click to enlarge.

Mandatory helmet legislation has perpetuated the negative image of cycling as an inherently dangerous activity that requires protection, regardless of actual risks… But injury statistics from the public bicycle share schemes around the world (where helmets are not required) show the risk of injury is low. In the first three months of the London scheme, share bikes were used more than six million times and the injury rate was a low 0.0023%.

While I personally have a pro-choice opinion when it comes to helmets there is no doubt they can saves lives. My mum always reminds me of  the time when my sister was about 7, was speeding along, got the death wobbles and crashed in the cement wall of an underpass. Without a helmet on she would most likely have had brain damage. This is why Monica and I think the invisible airbag bicycle helmet, Hövding is amazing. We can always rely on the Swedes to come up with the goods.

Hövding allows bicyclists to protect their heads on the road, without sacrificing style in the process. Hövding is a collar for bicyclists, worn around the neck, that blends in with the rest of your clothes. The collar contains a folded up airbag that you’ll only see if you happen to have an accident. The airbag is shaped like a hood, surrounding and protecting the bicyclist’s head. The trigger mechanism is controlled by sensors which pick up the abnormal movements of a bicyclist in an accident. Hövding has two parts: a collar and a shell. You get to pick the shell design of your choice.

What a fantastic christmas gift, check out their site here for stockists or order online from their website.

While most of the Winter B-icicle Challengers around the world are facing the same difficulties: dodging snowflakes, slippery patches of ice, and the never ending battle with those pesky cars, only those of you in the bigger cities will have to deal with problems related to air pollution.

For those of you living in a Chinese city air pollution is a genuine hazard. Here in Beijing the US Embassy has a twitter (@BeijingAir) that every hour or so alerts followers of Beijing’s air pollution levels, and in November of last year pollution levels became so bad they showed up as ‘Crazy Bad’. Apparently someone in the embassy with a sense of humour had listed that as anything over 500 (which is beyond their testing limits).

Since then the embassy have changed ‘Crazy Bad’ to ‘Beyond Index’ and in the last few days it’s turned up far too often on @BeijingAir.

I snapped the above photo on my way to work. But, as luck would have it, today at work I published a neat-o infographic we’d been working on which details precautions you can take to protect yourself from air pollution. I’ve included an excerpt below but head here to see the whole thing.

One simple and affordable measure I would take is wearing an N95 mask. You can buy these from Taobao for only 17RMB (I’ve just bought two for Emily and I), and apparently can also be found at pharmacies. Be sure to buy the correct type however, as listed below. Surgical masks won’t do you any good.

A Simple Six

A Simple Six have been great with their involvement in the Winter B-icicle Challenge and have sent in some great tips, including home made balaclavas two of the kids wore to school on the eve of the B-icicle Challenge.

The family’s website, A Simple Six, tracks the different modes of transport they use each week and it’s impressive how much detail is provided. When Stacey (the mom/mum of A Simple Six) decided to embark on the car-lite journey she knew it would involve:

Creating new habits, manifesting new routines, using new service providers, and shopping at different stores must be a part of the process. This family of six was going to have to change our ways.

The motivation to go car lite also stemmed from deeper desires about the kind of life she wanted for herself and her family:

 I want more experiences, greater health, wholeness and well-being. These were my desires for my family. Selling our van was one effort I could make in this process.

What I really like about A Simple Six, is the recognition that we need to shift the way we live and ‘create new habits’ in order for sustainable living to be achieved. This is a core motivation behind the Winter B-icicle Challenge. It may not be comfortable riding to work everyday in winter but it does push us to actively change our lifestyles.

Lane Change is delighted to have such an inspiring family join in on the Winter B-icicle Challenge. I know if I start to feel the cold and start dragging my feet I’ll only have to think of Stacey and Brent and their 4 children for a bit of inspiration.

All images are by A Simple Six

Winter B-icicle challengers in Beijing woke up to the sight of thick, fluffy snowflakes falling from the sky. I snapped the above photo on my way to work. Over the next three months the weather will most definitely throw a few hairy snowballs your way, so it’s important to know how to ride safely when temperatures begin to fall (and fall) below zero.

Luckily All Weather Sports (via Take Part) has some great advice:

• Try to pedal smoothly and relax your upper body, especially on ice and soft snow.
• Road ice can provide lots of traction or very little. Learn how the different types look and sound. Try not to brake hard on the slippery sort, or if you must, use only your rear brake. Watch for dry patches where you can do your braking or turning.
• Wide tires with widely separated knobs work best on snow.
• Use low pressure: start with 15-20 psi and experiment for yourself. Sometimes 5 psi feels great.
• Studded tires and chains improve traction on ice, but will slow you down.

Along with that we’d add a few ‘common sense’ pointers for bad weather days:

• Be overcautious: ride slower than usual and best not to have your headphones on.
• With poor visibility try and use bike lights or wear reflective vests or stickers.
• Dress warmly – even if it makes you look like a stuffed sausage. Thermals, beanies, thick socks, big scarves, gloves, vests and boots are all musts.

Head to All Weather Sports for a full rundown on tips and all-weather equipment, especially for those cycling out in the countryside or for long periods of time.

Have any other tips to add? Leave them in the comments section below!