Duff weather forecasts.

At the risk of sounding like a right whinger, I find weather forecasts to be
worse than useless i.e you are better off ignoring them than trying to make
decisions based upon them. It is their inconsistency that gets me - they
seem to constantly contradict themselves. Even on the met office pages, the
picture can say one thing and the text can say something completely
different.

Sorry, but I have given up on them. I just take my chances.

Ian

Simon Mason said:

The BBC and other websites' weather forecasts showed "light rain
showers" for today, so I went to work on my road bike. At 1930 it
looked like the end of the world outside; torrential rain, lightning
and 30 mph winds and it's pitch black even though the sun isn't due to
set for another 2 hours. The roads are deep under water and I've no
mudguards or jacket for the ride home - oh well! Come back Michael
Fish.

I rode to the start of tonight's "10" near Cirencester in the heaviest
rain I have ever seen. When I got there the marshals had decided
conditions were too dangerous (50 yds visibility if you could bear to
keep your eyes open, and floods) and cancelled it. Bit of an [censored] as
there wasn't a breath of wind and it could have easily been the best
time of the season.

On the bright side, it stopped raining 15 minutes after I got back to
race HQ. I wiped the bike down with a towel and it is sparkling clean,
even the sprockets and chainrings - there wasn't a whole lot of oil left
on the chain though.

In news:[email hidden],
Simon Mason <[email hidden]> expounded sagaciously:

Quoted message said:

The BBC and other websites' weather forecasts showed "light rain
showers" for today, so I went to work on my road bike. At 1930 it
looked like the end of the world outside; torrential rain, lightning
and 30 mph winds and it's pitch black even though the sun isn't due to
set for another 2 hours. The roads are deep under water and I've no
mudguards or jacket for the ride home - oh well! Come back Michael
Fish.
--
Simon M.

I think you'll find that it WAS michael who gave the forecast on telly last
night.
He's right, it IS nice weather for fish.
--

Martin Bulmer

Pie Conservation Threat

Quoted message said:

Even on
the met office pages, the picture can say one thing and the text can
say something completely different.

The pictures are an average of the weather in that area over the timescale.
Thus anything that has a mix of weather (e.g. sun + cloud) can mean pretty
much anything. Thus it might rain even if there are no rain symbols on the
map at all. Still, gotta feel sorry for the poor forecasters, trying to
predict weather in Britain.

(Simon Mason) said:

The BBC and other websites' weather forecasts showed "light rain
showers" for today, so I went to work on my road bike. At 1930 it
looked like the end of the world outside; torrential rain, lightning
and 30 mph winds and it's pitch black even though the sun isn't due to
set for another 2 hours. The roads are deep under water and I've no
mudguards or jacket for the ride home - oh well! Come back Michael
Fish.
--

Hey, come on, fair play is required here.
hought you normally use:

http://uk.weather.com/

[at least that's what I thought you said a short while back].

Has the BBC now become the primary scapegoat for all the world's woes?
[According to some of my friends it has.....I love 'em dearly, but
boy, do they crank the same old 'grudge yarn' over beer of a night.
Life will be so much better without the BBC...more choice and
diversity at last. It's going to be amazing...

Garry

Mark Thompson <[email hidden]> wrote in
news:[email hidden]:

Quoted message said:

Still, gotta feel sorry for the poor forecasters, trying to
predict weather in Britain.

S'funny, the forecasters here in Australia don't really have as much to
talk about as they do in the UK as there is much less regional variation,
but they do go on for a lot longer. The traditional view of the British is
that they love to talk about the weather, but it's even worse over here.
They give the maximum and minimum temperatures for about half a dozen
places, all within about 30km radius of the centre of Perth and they even
show a time-lapse shot over the river Swan so you can see what the weather
has been like all day (summer=blue sky, winter=blue sky, maybe a few
clouds).

If you want to know the weather, look out of the window!

:-)

Graeme

Simon Mason said:

The BBC and other websites' weather forecasts showed "light rain
showers" for today, so I went to work on my road bike.

Opposite for me. The TV forecasts were warning of the weather you
were hit with. At 6pm it was looking threatening, with a few drops of rain.
I thought sod it, and went out for a spin anyway. Glad I did - one and a
half hours out on a good ride. It did rain heavily after I got back.

Simon Mason said:

The BBC and other websites' weather forecasts showed "light rain
showers" for today, so I went to work on my road bike. At 1930 it
looked like the end of the world outside; torrential rain, lightning
and 30 mph winds and it's pitch black even though the sun isn't due to
set for another 2 hours. The roads are deep under water and I've no
mudguards or jacket for the ride home - oh well! Come back Michael

I was just about to leave work last night when the heavens opened. Being
without a raincoat, I opted to stay put for a couple of hours...

At least the weather is cool and fresh today.

Regards,

-david

"Zog The Undeniable" <[email hidden]> wrote in message
news:4100254f.0@entanet...

Quoted message said:

I rode to the start of tonight's "10" near Cirencester in the heaviest
rain I have ever seen. When I got there the marshals had decided
conditions were too dangerous (50 yds visibility if you could bear to
keep your eyes open, and floods) and cancelled it. Bit of an [censored] as
there wasn't a breath of wind and it could have easily been the best
time of the season.

I was lucky. By 2200 it had stopped and there was a nice backwind :-)

--
Simon M.

Simon Mason said:

I was lucky. By 2200 it had stopped and there was a nice backwind :-)

Simon

I'm shocked. You failed to mention <http://www.xcweather.co.uk/> ;-)

James

PS Unless 2200 was the wind speed of course.

"James Hodson" <[email hidden]> wrote in message
news:[email hidden]...

Quoted message said:

Simon Mason said:

I was lucky. By 2200 it had stopped and there was a nice backwind :-)

Simon

I'm shocked. You failed to mention <http://www.xcweather.co.uk/> ;-)

It showed no wind on that site at 2120, but that's at Humberside airport and
the steam coming out of our cooling towers showed a nice stiff easterly :-)

Simon Mason said:

It showed no wind on that site at 2120, but that's at Humberside airport and
the steam coming out of our cooling towers showed a nice stiff easterly :-)

Raise your saddle when riding west.

James