At Home or Winning Transcontinental, Be Seen in Apidura Packable Visibility Vest

Jan 25, 2024

Apidura’s new Packable Visibility Vest makes sure you are seen without weighing you down or flapping uncontrollably in the wind. That is whether you are racing (and winning) The Transcontinental Race, bikepacking for a long weekend, or just riding your home roads. Apidura adapted lessons learned in developing lightweight hydration vests & backpacks for the Visibility Vest. They created a well-fitted hi-viz vest, so you are seen from all directions while riding from dusk, all through the night, and into the dawn.

You don’t have to be an ultra-distance Audaxer to benefit from extra visibility on dark roads…

Hi-viz vests are a staple of road workers and bicycle commuters alike for one simple reason. Being seen by drivers is a big first step towards staying safe while sharing the road. That’s why Audax rules often require a certified hi-viz vest. And it’s why Apidura developed their Packable Visibility Vest for regular bike commuters, casual road cyclists, and serious long-distance racers.

It’s a lightweight hi-viz solution that packs down into a tiny built-in pouch. That way, you can always have it on those long rides that extend into the dark. It’s also EN 17353 certified so you can use it for your Paris-Brest-Paris audaxing, or just for morning & evening commutes. It’s 360° nighttime visibility that won’t get in the way of you enjoying road riding – year-round and around-the-clock.

The minimalist Apidura Packable Visibility Vest is certified to EN 17353:2020 Type B3 standard. That designation is for safe night-time visibility for “medium risk” situations like cycling on unlit roads. That basically means plenty of reflective detailing so you can be seen from all angles. But few cycling-specific solutions are actually EN 17353 certified. And most EN 17353 certified solutions are bulky, unnecessarily heavy, or just uncomfortable to ride in for long distances. The newer EN 17353:2020 Type B3 certification seems to mean it is also compliant with legacy EN 1150 & EN 20471 standards, too.

There are countless visibility vests outside of the cycling world that are often fine for casual cycling after dark, but there’s nothing that offers full legal compliance and lightweight materials, packability and a race fit. We know riders and event organisers alike find it frustrating, so we decided to explore how our packable and racing design experience could be brought to bear. EN compliance was essential, but we also wanted to replicate the convenience of a lightweight gilet and make sure the vest was as unobtrusive as possible both while riding and when not in use.

From my point of view, riding at night is fundamental to endurance racing. It also offers riders the opportunity to experience empty roads, moonlit vistas, and mountain dawns. At Lost Dot we firmly believe that the responsibility for road safety lies firmly with the drivers of vehicles, but we’re also pragmatic and retroreflective garments make a huge difference.

Apidura’s Packable Visibility Vest uses the same anatomic shaping as their Hydration Vest (and newer Hydration Backpack) for a good fit. It uses similar lightweight material & minimalist design as the other Packables. And it features two of the same Packables adjustable sternum straps so it can fit over a thin jersey or a warmer puffy jacket, too. The vest includes no zippers and no velcro – just 2 plastic buckles on straps adjustable to fit different body shapes and genders.

Protection from the wind or rain was not in the design brief. Instead, the vest focuses only on visibility. But that makes it suitable for year-round use, too.

The hi-viz vest weighs just 106g (claimed for S/M). It packs down into its own 8x12cm rear pocket, to easily fit in a standard jersey pocket. (Specifically, can you spot the tiny packed vest in Christoph Strasser’s TCRNo9 race-winning bikepacking kit grid above?)

The Apidura Packable Visibility Vest comes in two sizes – a S/M for 90-105cm & L/XL for 106-122cm chest circumferences. The Visibility Vest is available now direct from Apidura for £45 / $58 / 52€, and through their retail partners.

My question meanwhile is, could Apidura just add all that hi-viz yellow and extra visibility to their regular Racing Hydration Vest to meet that same EN 17353 certification? And make every ultra-distance racer safer in the process?

Thus, here’s a parting enquiry for road & gravel readers:

Would you prefer to have the added visibility all the time? Additionally, would you mind if your regular hydration vest were always hi-viz, even for daytime gravel rides? I suspect most mountain bikers don’t always want a hi-viz hydration pack. That is, based on the number of black, blue, green & red Camelbaks I’ve encountered over the years. Maybe though, for those times roadies & gravel riders do put a pack on their back, they (like me) may actually prefer hi-viz.

So, let us know in the comments below.

Apidura.com