Heat rash

[thekarens]

Have you recently started taking any new medication? Sometimes medicine will make you hypersensitive to the sun and rashes even if you normally aren't prone to that.

I started taking birth control and thyroid medicine about 2.5 months ago.

[Norse]

I get it too sometimes. Aloe vera gel helps. So do diaper rash products like Desitin.

[MommaB]

You may want to check with your physician if it continues. Some thyroid medications and birth control pills can cause users to have photosensitivity reactions.

[marni]

just a random thought but artificial sweeteners can cause a sun sensitivity- haven't had much burning since I quit using sugar and sweeteners.

I rode 50 the other day without the heat rash- I gooped up with everything balm (all natural bee wax based with eucalyptus,tea tree oil, aconite, rosemary, lavender aloe and calendula) as a base layer,and then layered sunscreen over that. It worked so will continue and see if it continues to help. I am a very salty sweater so that may be part of the problem as well.

Anyway, thought the thing about sweetener might help as well.

[Aggie_Ama]

Some of my shorts do that, it can get a little irritated on me. Maybe try Body Glide? I use that to help prevent chafing when I run and my big thighs try to rub. I also use it under seams of my sports bra because sometimes those rub.

[thekarens]

I should clarify that I'm getting the rash where nothing is touching it. Today the rash is worse after my ride. It literally felt like my thighs were frying and they are very pretty now. I did change the sunscreen. I tried Neutrogena baby sunscreen today. I'm considering just covering up the thighs and ditching the sunscreen. Sheila, you use the LG Neo shorts, right? I think I've read that they come down to or almost down to the knee?

[luvmyguys]

So here's what I was told today by one of the coaches - the heat rash starts to show up when your core starts to get overheated. I'm still trying to figure out how that happens, but it was at this point that I was handed a baggie of ice to stuff my bra with.

[OakLeaf]

So here's what I was told today by one of the coaches - the heat rash starts to show up when your core starts to get overheated. I'm still trying to figure out how that happens, but it was at this point that I was handed a baggie of ice to stuff my bra with.

Did the rash go away then?

[ny biker]

So, it's my turn. Last Sunday I rode about 68 miles on a hot sunny day. It was a long, slow ride with various stops for mechanical issues and missed turns as well as scheduled rest stops. Later that day I noticed some red, slightly puffy blotches on my legs, just below the where my shorts ended and just above my knees. At first I thought it was sunburn, but it didn't hurt. It didn't itch, either.

Today (Saturday) I did a 62-mile ride. It was not quite as hot, and though the sky was blue for most of the ride there were a fair number of clouds in the sky to keep the temps in the 80s, below average for July in the DC area. And after the ride I noticed the same red, slightly puffy blotches just below where my shorts ended.

Based on my extensive experience with contact dermatitis, I do not think this is a sunscreen allergy. If it was, I would be covered in an itchy rash, especially on my face.

But -- I also have a history of mystery hives, which my doctor has diagnosed as autoimmune hives. Most commonly this manifests as small red bumps that itch like crazy at first and then slowly fade over several days. Sometimes it is worse than that, with wheals that look like classic hives or angioedema. Anyway I started to experience a flare-up 2 days before the bike ride last Sunday, with small itchy red bumps that mostly have occurred above and below my knees.

So my first thought is that the red puffy blotches are related to the extra histamines that are in my system right now.

I started taking an antihistamine (Zyrtec) every day back in January, and this is the first time since then that I've seen more than an occasional random red itchy bump. Today I stopped at the store to get some Zantac, which is an H2 inhibitor, and I will start taking that to see if it helps the Zyrtec beat down this particular episode. I'm hoping that once these hives fade away then the red puffy patches will also stop appearing.

[Bike Writer]

I started taking birth control and thyroid medicine about 2.5 months ago.

For a brief time I was taking a med for my rheumatoid arthritis that had a warning about avoiding direct sunlight, careful as I was if I got sun it made me nauseous.

[luvmyguys]

I think the arm coolers would probably work better in a drier climate. They get waterlogged pretty quickly in humidity, the way I sweat. At that point they don't help cool me, but they definitely are no hotter than bare skin. I have tried taking them off when it was unbearably hot, and it did not help. When they're not waterlogged, it's uncanny how much cooler they feel.

I got the Craft arm coolers on the recommendation of the sage voices here, and last Saturday, they were much cooler when they were sprayed down. They worked great anyway (I could tell the difference when I took them off), but I noticed a positive difference when they were wet.

The only thing I had to get used to was the binding feeling on my arms, but the coolers worked as advertised.

I recently started developing the same thing. Since the first time it showed up was with a new pair of shorts, I thought I might be developing an allergy to the silicone in the gripperbands or something like that. Took a baby benedryl, rinsed it off with cool water and put aloe vera on it and it was cleared up by the next day. Since I got it again with an old familiar pair of shorts yesterday, I guess it is heat rash and will start putting on an allergy cream before I put on the shorts- good to know what it is.

I had something similar happen, in that I was getting some sort of rash right where the gripper bands were. The next time I was out, I noticed that I only had the problem on the top of my legs, and not the back side. I started using Body Glide where the grippers were, and haven't had any problems since. Guess it was chafing in the heat.

(Yours may still be heat rash. But that might be useful for someone else.)