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Trail Ridge Road on a summer tour in Rocky Mountain National Park |
Like your feet, these far-from-the-torso appendages will get colder faster than the rest of you. Keeping your torso warm will help out, because your body won't be restricting the blood flow out to those extremities. But fingers take the brunt of cold winds and, unlike feet, must remain sufficiently maneuverable to let you work your brakes and gears.
On the warmest, sun-filled winter days I get by with poly liners (not those cotton garden jobs) worn under regular bike gloves. These liners are what I wear when pitching and breaking camp, because they're thin enough for me to do almost everything. Liners can be what you wear inside the huge bike mittens you'll find in bike and equipment/clothing catalogs, or you can choose thick ski gloves followed by waterproof (and therefore windproof) over-mitts or shells. Whichever route you take, don't skimp on the insulation. Take a descent at twenty miles per hour on an otherwise windless thirty-degree day and the wind chill — the temperature your fingers will be feeling — will be just three above.
And here's a final principle of staying warm: Don't expect thick gloves or mitts (or even tights or jackets or any insulation anywhere) to work magic by themselves. You have to generate some heat inside. Eat heartily in winter, and include those fat-rich items you might wisely avoid at home. Keep your furnace stoked and yourself moving. When you can do it safely, remove your hands from the bars (uh, one at a time) and clinch and unclinch those fingers. Wiggle your toes. And when you pitch camp, get inside your sleeping bag long before you get chilled.
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