Riding in winter

That's from Wikipedia/Yahoo answers and it's rubbish - November 1 as the start of winter?! Winter begins technically 21 December, but is generally considered as 1 December onwards. They just said this on Radio 4 so it must be true.

21st december is the shortest day/winter solstice, so surely that would be the middle of winter?

I guess that would make june 21st/summer solstice that middle of summer too.

i think this makes sense to me. nov/dec/jan = winter, may june july = summer.
all others are spring autumn.