My heros....

[Rumblefish]

are all of you ladies (and gentlemen where applicable ) who live in warm/hot climes year round!

I just took my bike to the grocery store for a few random things and to the drug store and sheesh it's hot out today!! (86 degrees, with a feels like of 90!! ) Barely a mile ride round trip had me sweating up a storm!

I am officially in awe of anyone who lives in crazy hot heat year round...I don't know how you do it without melting!

[IFjane]

Rumblefish - I doubt your weather is much different than ours down here in VA. You just do it. If you like to bike enough, you'll get out in any weather (well, almost!). My tricks - drink, drink, drink; pour almost as much water on your head as you pour in your mouth; ride early or late & wear a base layer that will wick the sweat away from your trunk. I find that once I get going, the headwind I create makes it relatively comfortable. Stopping gets really hot, though!

I am not saying I ride when it is 105 degrees with 89% humidity. I don't. But if it's 95 degrees I might consider a short one.

[kaybee]

As IFjane said, you drink a lot! We got a late start yesterday, and it was about 95 when we finished our 43 miles, but as long as we were moving, we were making a breeze that helped to keep us reasonably cool. I'm much more of a cold (or maybe I should say "cool," since we don't get much of a winter here) weather wimp -- when the daytime high dips below about 60 degrees and the winds pick up, the bikes go into storage and I run more.

You just adapt. If you did it regularly, you would think nothing of it.

KB

[RoadRaven]

The trick is... apart from drinking LOTS... is to go REAL fast, and then you create a lovely breeze...

[CorsairMac]

New Mexico here:

my Preference is to hike the mountains between say noon and 3:00 coz the temps are up in the upper 90s - 100s and there aren't as many people around. I did all my centuries in the summer coz - like Kaybee - when the temps drop below 60 I'm cold. I'll take the heat ANY day over cold....course it's a "dry" heat!!

[Jiffer]

Dh and I didn't have much choice in doing or final training long ride in weather that was as obscene as it gets. We had a century a week away and needed to get in at least 65 miles. We left at 6:45 a.m and it was already miserable out. Humid as heck. Luckily, the humidity got "slightly" better as the clouds dissipated, but by the time we got home 67 miles later at 12:30, the temps were up to about 108.

Horrid. Yet ... I can say I did it and survived! Poured TONS of water on the head and all over my body throughout the ride which REALLY helps. I would typically avoid riding in that type of weather if I had any choice, but this was the only day we could do it and I so wanted to ensure myself that I was as ready as I could be for my first century. What a blessing it was to do that century in the most perfectly beautiful weather ever!!! 65 at the start along the coast of Southern California.