Excellent weather planning site

cgolvin · #1 03-22-2019, 02:48 PM

(Apologies if this has been posted before, I didn't see anything in a quick search.)

A friend just shared this very useful site. It provides a detailed weather forecast for the entirety of a ride, based on the start time, route, and pace information that you supply (route can be uploaded or simply provide the RideWithGPS route id). You are able to specify the interval between weather updates as well.

You're welcome.

joosttx · #2 03-22-2019, 02:56 PM

Thank you. This is really cool. I have to say darksky is the best weather app for my area.

cgolvin · #3 03-22-2019, 02:58 PM

Agree, have been using it for several months and it is outstanding

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dustyrider · #4 03-22-2019, 04:36 PM

Usually I rely on my senses but weather.gov is useful too.

palincss · #5 03-23-2019, 07:37 AM

This is a fabulous idea. Just yesterday I was trying to visualize the effect of the wind on a route I was going to lead today and realized I couldn't picture WNW as a wind direction, so spent a half hour with screen grabs of the route and a compass rose and a photo editor putting a composite together. (I finally decided to postpone the ride until Sunday, when it'll be less windy and much warmer.)

And here's a site that does all that and more, just by plugging in the date and time and the RWGPS route number! Amazing. I'm impressed.

BUT - it would be nice if there was some documentation. For example, the route changes color as you move down the hour-by-hour forecast - sometimes - occasionally going from red to green. What does that mean? Are those sections where you're going right into the wind?

And there's almost a quarter of the screen space given to control points, and no explanation at all of what they are, how to add and use them, and what they're for.

Does anyone know more about this app than what you can see just looking at the screen?

unterhausen · #6 03-23-2019, 07:55 AM

this is similar to "Epic ride weather," which has a phone app. I did a 400km ride where Epic showed the winds shifting so we had headwinds for all 250 miles. I have to say that was what I thought happened, but I couldn't believe that our luck was quite that bad. It was very interesting to see validation from an app.