Friday, July 14, 2006

It's Like Africa Hot

About four miles from home today, at the end of one of my usual routes, I crapped out because of the heat. I wasn't dehydrated, nor did I need to eat. I was just sapped. My body could no longer do what I was asking it to do without cooling off first. I've heard about heat wilting you, but man . . . Those last few miles I felt like I was crawling and that gravity was exerting twice the force on me. Worse, that first mile was a slow, gradual hill that seemed to mock me. I couldn't find a comfortable position, my legs felt like spaghetti noodles and my eyes were stinging with sweat.

Here's the difference. Time of day. I usually ride in the morning, but not today. So even though I've ridden through air temperatures similar to this afternoon's, the position of the sun and the heat that was absorbing and reflecting off the asphalt made it worse.

What a sorry sight I must have been. I know. I was there.

My wheels should arrive tomorrow. So it's a perfect time to take some time out of the saddle. I need to reverse my cellular damage.

3 comments:

  1. Anonymous12:09 PM

    Dude,

    I feel your pain. Be sure to hydrate, take your multivitamins and do some sort of easy recovery spin today to help your body heal.

    The Physicist

    ReplyDelete
  2. Anonymous4:22 PM

    No arguments there. I still feel fried today. And, hey, it'll be in the 90s for the rest of the week!

    ReplyDelete
  3. Anonymous8:45 PM

    Same here...it's either morning rides or trainer rides for me. Makes it darn hard to do a long tempo ride unless I'm willing to get up at some ungodly early hour. It looks like that's the plan for Monday. Even God's not up at 6 on a Monday. Blech!

    The Physicist

    ReplyDelete