Heat Training:

Summer is here!  That brings with it some interesting and special considerations.  It gets hot here.  Does that sound inane and obvious?  Consider, we mean hotter than the hinges of Hades hot!

I’m going out on a limb here.  I think that, this year, we are going to have us one of those old fashioned, blister hot, Summers.  Look out for August!  It’s warm to hot now.  By then, it will be even more so.  I could be wrong, but that’s where I’m putting my bet.

It’s worth thinking about.  More, there are various kinds of hot.  (For a bit of technical discussion on this, go down to the bottom of this post.  For advice on how to handle the heat now, and how to prepare for what’s coming, look at the next section.)

HOW TO COPE NOW, AND HOW TO PREPARE FOR WHAT IS TO COME:

First Important Fact:  Heat adds to the stress the body faces.  The body has to work to cool off.  In extreme heat, respiration, and heart rate are increased.  More blood flow is needed to transport heat from the core to the surface, and to move fluid to the sweat glands in the skin.  If exercise effort is added to this, the effort is increased significantly.  In short; When it gets real hot slow down!

Acclimate gradually.  Riding in high heat is a skill as much as it is an acquired ability.  It is necessary to learn to ride in the heat.  It takes some time.  The best approach is to go into the heat gradually.  Find out how your body reacts to heat loads, and what to do about it.

Honest folks, high heat applies stresses to the body.  It takes energy to deal with higher temps. 

One good strategy is to break the day’s riding into smaller and shorter rides.  Do an early morning or late evening ride for conditioning.  And then, plan a short ride in the mid afternoon.  Find out what it takes to go out for lesser times, and expose yourself to those stresses for only a half hour or less.  Then, very gradually increase the high heat exposure.  Learn to handle the heat, just as you would learn to handle the cold.

Think Lycra!  Technical clothing helps keep you cool.  It transports moisture away from your body, evaporating it, and cooling you.  Jerseys are not just a style statement, they work!  Cotton is a miserable thing to wear when it gets hot.

More practical stuff:  For tourists and event riders, this kind of roaring hot weather is of some concern.  Most folks can avoid the blast of mid-day super-heatedness.  But if you are doing something that requires riding right through it, take precautions.

Start by becoming acclimated to the heat now.  If you are “hiding from the hot” now, and you go out into an all day ride in August…  Well, friends, it won’t be pretty.

Learn to drink on the bike.  I don’t mean a sip every now and again.  I mean, learn to get some quantity of water down you, and do it regularly.  It’s amazing, but once heat fatigue starts to set in, a lot of people seem to actually resist drinking more.  I think it may be that the thought of swallowing tepid water makes them feel as if it would make them hotter.  Continue on this path, and heat exhaustion is very close at hand!

Use water to wet yourself down and cool off.

If you are getting really hot, get off the bike!  Seek shade.  Sit down.  Get your helmet off.  Dowse yourself.  Consider calling for help.

TECHNICAL DISCUSSION OF SUMMER AND HEAT:

A quick lesson in orbital mechanics:  Our planet has a tilt.  That’s why we have seasons.  On the Summer Solstice, our north pole is pointed as close to the sun as it will get.  This means the sun is almost directly overhead at noon.  (That’s real noon, not Daylight Saving Time.  So 13:00 EDT here in Georgia.)  Further, the sun appears to get up above the horizon, and overhead pretty quickly, and it stays there.  This effect is gradually diminishing as we move toward the Autumnal Equinox, in late September.  But for now, the sun goes up fast, and stays there.  Then it goes down fast.

So the sun spends more of the day shining almost straight down, through the atmosphere the thin way, instead of sideways.  That means the full strength of the sun is landing on us as we ride.  There is little shade on the roads when the sun that high in the sky.

What does heat mean?  When we hear the temperature given on the radio, or see it online, it usually refers to either the air temperature, or to the temperature in the shade.  (An unshaded thermometer will show a much higher reading.)  The sun heats the air somewhat by shining on it, but most of the heating comes from conduction.  That is, the sun shines through the air, and heats the ground.  The ground, being next to the air, conducts some heat into it, heating it.  At night, the ground radiates the heat back out into space, and gets a lot cooler.  (This, by the way, is why cloudy nights are usually warmer.)

What does all this have to do with me?  Simple.  In the morning, the ground is cool.  The sky is getting warm, and does so quickly.  By early afternoon, the ground temp (particularly road surfaces) is really getting up there!

Practical Aspects:  This time of year, you can expect (given a sunny day) that it will be cooler in the morning.  Not cool mind you, but cooler.  Air temp will rise rapidly after sunrise.  By 10:00, it’s getting warm, and there is little shade.  Somewhere around 1:00 to 2:00 P.M. an interesting effect comes into play.  Up until that time, you’ve been feeling the heat of the sun.  But in the early afternoon, suddenly the road is hot!  Your feet and legs start feeling the heat, as well as your head!  This is the “Bake and Broil Effect.”  That will last until late afternoon.  You notice that your feet are hot, but your head is starting to cool a bit.  By around 6:00 P.M. the road is beginning to lose heat, and your lower extremities aren’t picking up so much.

All of this amounts to the following:   Be wary of the middle of the day!

Take it easy.  Enjoy the sunshine.  Have fun out there.  This is a great time to build base, with long slow rides.  You’ll be stronger in the Autumn for it.