Le Col x Wahoo Indoor Training Jersey

The Le Col x Wahoo Indoor Training Jersey is a supremely breathable, good looking top for wearing on your trainer, or outside if it's stinking hot. With most of the features you'd expect of a premium jersey, it's a versatile bit of kit for working out hard.

With coronavirus set to restrict outdoors riding across the world for the summer to come and indoor riding more popular than ever, it's no wonder brands like Le Col are creating focused products for the discerning rider. And no other issue defines riding indoors more than sweat. Working hard without the benefit of a 20mph breeze, those litres of moisture need to go somewhere to help cool your muscles.

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We sweat to allow cooling by evaporation – the chill you feel when even warm airflow hits sweaty skin is the energy taken from your skin as the liquid evaporates. Your skin is flat and two-dimensional, but a garment's fabric is 3D – each fibre is knitted into a complex shape that has air flowing all around it – so its surface area is much greater than the area it lies on. Therefore it can absorb, then allow to evaporate a much larger volume of moisture than just bare skin. This is why you see many pro cyclists wearing baselayers on super-hot days – not to keep warm, rather to keep them cooler than they otherwise would be. There are a few other issues like comfort and modesty that a baselayer helps with, but the main benefit is improved cooling.

The Le Col x Wahoo Indoor Training Jersey takes the baselayer-as-radiator theory and makes it look seemly, while adding three pockets, a silicone grip strip, full-length zip (with garage) and laser-cut arm grippers. So in other words, a normal summer jersey – but at just 90g weighing about half to one-third the weight of most.

Low weight is hardly surprising in a garment basically made of very small holes to allow airflow, so the trick is in actually making what fabric you do have be spread out as much as possible in three dimensions to maximise its area, and thereby its evaporation potential.

Included in that 90g you get three standard pockets, but no valuables zip pocket – fair enough, it's pretty unlikely you'll need one in your basement or at the gym, where putting a locker key in the normal pocket wouldn't suffice. The pockets are fine for accommodating a phone, or a few bars if you like to eat on the trainer.

Fit-wise it's pretty slim – I'm in the range for medium as reviewed, but feel a large would have been a bit more comfortable, especially around the bicep. The length and fit around the shoulders were spot on.

The jersey comes in two versions – this blue-pink 'Collective Edition', with matching bib shorts available (full review imminent), and a black version. Personally I love the blue-pink – and I think it's definitely the one to go for if you plan on riding outside, as the contrast with skin and bib straps underneath is much less marked than in the black. If wearing outside you should note there's absolutely no claimed SPF rating for the fabric, so suncream would be essential.

I own a few really lightweight jerseys, including an earlier version of the Castelli Aero Race. Comparing the two in the same room, sat on a bike in front of the same fan, there's a marked difference I could feel. The Castelli – and any other summer jersey I compared – felt thicker and warmer. Once underway I was unzipping other jerseys much sooner than the Le Col, to improve airflow around the chest and then back. The looser neck fit of the Le Col meant there was some slight breeze, and as there's no need for 'aero' there are no worries about any possible flap in high wind.

After an hour of all-out efforts, with a saturated cap and sweat all over the floor, my upper body felt comfortable, with no sense of undue wetness. Obviously the jersey was holding a lot of moisture, but with no sense of perspiration pooling, say, in the small of my back, the fabric was still able to take up sweat and then allow it to evaporate.

My turbo plan calls for rides Monday, Wednesday and Friday, with kit going in a wool wash the same day as use. The supreme breathability of the Le Col jersey meant it was always dry as a bone within a few hours of washing, ready to go again. Washed three times a week for a few months, the jersey still looks as good as new, and so long as you're careful to wash it inside out and zipped up, I don't see why it wouldn't last many hundreds of washes.

> Buyer’s Guide: 25 of the best summer cycling jerseys

Similar jerseys at the price/weight point include the Gore C7 Race and the Rapha Flyweight. Both are more expensive – the Gore £159.99, the Rapha £130 – and both profess to be great at cooling you down, but not optimised for turbo use specifically.

But £120 is still a lot for a superlight jersey. And is the extra 20-30g you're saving versus a summer jersey costing half the price justification enough? To argue on weight, or a premium price, is to miss the point of kit designed for wear during edge-of-reason physical efforts, though.

Renowned US cycling journalist and fitness guru Selene Yeager often speaks of 'Happiness Watts' – extra power, or reduced perceived effort that comes from a sense of wellbeing on the bike. Happiness Watts may come from a stunning view, or a great ride buddy, or nailing a section of singletrack, or having your bike's performance absolutely dialled. A sparkling clean drivetrain, or perfectly aligned gears – on paper that might make 0.1% to your speed, but mentally you're visualising shiny gears meshing perfectly, helping power you forward. That attitude boost counts for a lot more than the physics suggest.

To the list of Happiness Watts contributing factors I now add: keeping as cool as you know you can possibly be. The mental game of knowing that you have the best chance of hanging on all the way to the end of that last 150% FTP spike after 90 minutes of work – because your muscles are as efficient as they can be, because your jersey has done the best-possible job of shifting sweat off your skin. You may not be able to change the climate you're in, or get a bigger fan, but you can dress for the best effort – physically or mentally.

Knowing that I owned a number of light jerseys but one was better than the rest made the few times I reverted back to the others from the Le Col feel like a backward step. Warmer, sweating more, not 'enjoying' the session as much – all factors that, when on the ragged edge, make holding on another 15 seconds that much harder. At times like this you forget that the warmer jersey cost £50 less. You would pay a lot then and there to feel better, to achieve your goal. Given a jersey like the Le Col will most likely be worn many times a month, even a 100% price premium over a warmer, thicker jersey is quickly paid off, leaving you as cool as you can be. And that's what it's all about.

Verdict

Supremely cool, great looking jersey for all-out efforts where you need the best setup