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Whether to ride in hot weather
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Some of my friends could live a happy life if they never watched the Weather Channel on TV again. Not me.
Especially when I’m going to be traveling cross-country for an interstate trip, I like to watch the weather trends for two weeks ahead of time, at least, in order to plan our route. Despite that, Jim and I have ridden in a hurricane, between tornados that we could see, in a hailstorm, in a complete white-out from fog, in blinding thunderstorms and tropical showers. We’ve outrun a blizzard and cooked in 100-plus degree heat. The coldest temperature we’ve ridden in, so far as I know, is 22 degrees, in late March, when a dry cold front descended upon the South as we were on our way to Tupelo. The hottest was 105, one August near Tulsa.
I say “ridden” – obviously when conditions get too bad, we get off the road; but sometimes we’ve had to cover some miles in rough conditions to find a safe place to stop.
For the next several months, the challenge to riders in the Gulf Coast region will be the oppressive heat. The south wind blowing off the waters of the Gulf of Mexico will bring us widespread thunderstorms nearly every day, in some part of Houston. When they pass, the heat is even worse.
One solution for riders is to wear something like a Kool Kollar. This seems to be a generic name for the item, including a product for keeping pets cool, and there are several designs for them. But the Kool Kollar I like is something a middling seamstress or hobbyist can make. It’s similar to the one shown near the bottom right part of the page here, at tinyurl.com/oevce9.
Take a strip of terry cloth about 26” long and 9" wide, and fold it in half. Sew the two sides together on the short ends, leaving a half-inch seam allowance. (You may have to make the collar longer depending on how big the rider is.) Then sew along the long side partway from each end in toward the middle, leaving an opening about 6" long. See the drawing below to get the idea.
At the opening, put a thin strip of Velcro along both sides so that you can open and close it, and it will stay shut when the collar is filled with ice. (In the one on the Website shown above, it closes with a zipper. If you sew and you want to be fancy, that’s fine – but it’s not necessary.) Turn the collar inside-out, so that the seams are now on the inside of it.
Put the collar around your neck so that the long ends hang down. Then put Velcro on those two ends so that the collar will close and stay closed, by crossing the ends over so that they lay flat on your chest.
When you want to use your Kool Kollar, you first put a plastic bag (a newspaper bag works perfectly) full of ice inside the terry cloth collar. Close the 6-inch opening, then put the collar on and close the whole thing in front.
The beauty of this is that you can put any kind of ice into it – clean ice from your house, ice that was in your soft drink or tea or lemonade, dirty ice that’s sitting inside a store to hold cans of beer and pop. You don’t have it touching you directly, and if it dirties up your plastic bag, you can easily get another one.
As you ride, the ice keeps the back of your neck cool, and the terry cloth will become wet and cold. The plastic bag will not be completely impermeable, so water will drop from each end of the collar onto your chest and down the inside of your jacket, and it will help cool you as you ride through evaporation.
Putting a fresh Kool Kollar on is a little bit of a shock at first, but you quickly acclimate to it. The cooling effect will last about 45 minutes to an hour before you must refill the plastic bag of ice, if the temperature is between 95 and 100 degrees F. If it’s over 100, the ice melts faster, and you’ll do well to keep the collar cold for half an hour. But even after it isn’t cold, it’s wet, so you do continue to benefit until the next time you’re planning to stop anyway.
The other advantage of this system is that you can use it all day. Other collars that have crystals in them which require you to pre-soak the collar will get warm as the day goes on. Unless you’re traveling with a group that’s carrying an ice chest (some Wingers put them on the rear, over the tongue of their trailers, on top of the cappuccino machine – yes?), then they won’t be useful when you really need it, in the middle of the day.
If you can’t make one yourself, the commercial kind with crystals inside are better than nothing at all to cool that blood going into your brain on a hot day.
It goes without saying that riding in the heat means being sufficiently hydrated. The wind and hot air take moisture out of the body continually, and you are dehydrated by the time you feel thirsty. Make sure you drink enough water, and if you like, some sort of sports drink that can help keep your electrolytes in balance.
As for what kind of signs to look for in order to tell a rider’s in trouble from heat, Jim and I drove up to the MSF training facility in San Marcos several summers ago for his instructor training. He had been on the range all morning and mid-day. The temperature was officially in the mid-90s, but the pavement reflected heat back up and it must have been over 100 in fact. Everyone was sweating buckets but determined to finish up.
Jim’s first clue that he was in trouble was when he ended a range exercise and gave the signal for the students to come back to their first position and form up. Then he turned his back on the range and walked away!
An instructor NEVER turns his back on riders with their engines running, so this was a huge error, and one he knew perfectly well not to make. The chief instructors were alarmed and told him to knock it off and get inside.
An hour later, when the course was over, his face was still beet red, and not from embarrassment, though there was that, too. He couldn’t explain why he had left his post like that, and his other logical processes were also off; he didn’t seem to be able to put things in proper sequence as we were loading up to leave.
On the way back only a few miles out of town, I realized he wasn’t making sense as we were talking, and he complained of a headache. I stopped the car at a restaurant and went inside for ice. I made an ice pack and insisted he sit inside for an hour and sip water (he was nauseated, too), until he was better. This was severe heat exhaustion (see http://tinyurl.com/2v4xq7), and it came on him very suddenly, even though he had been drinking water on the range and taking normal breaks. And he still didn’t recognize the signs himself at all.
True heat stroke may be fatal. (See http://tinyurl.com/q7vplq .) Signs of heat stroke are unconsciousness or markedly abnormal mental status (hallucinations, confusion, coma); flushed, hot dry skin (though the skin may be wet from earlier perspiration or attempts to cool the body with water); possibly hyperventilation; and elevated blood pressure. Suspected heat stroke, especially if there’s chest or abdominal pain, is a medical emergency. Permanent nerve, heart, liver or kidney problems may occur. The rider needs immediate medical care and should be taken by ambulance to an ER at once.
My own internal thermometer is also fried from being in the heat too long and exerting myself too much, but that was on a different kind of two-wheeled vehicle. Nonetheless, once you’ve blown your circuits in terms of regulating your body’s heating and cooling, it may never come back to normal, or not for a long time. Heat becomes much harder to tolerate afterwards.
We’ll have much lower than normal temps all this coming week, in the 70s. It should be wonderful for anyone who can get out and ride – and you sure won’t need your Kool Kollar. Next weekend, though, if you’re in a hot climate, try wearing one and see if it makes your ride more comfortable.
For more suggestions about riding in crosswinds, electrical storms and rain, see the Tips section at www.msgroup.org. Also check out Patty Davis's excellent article about motorcycles and lightning, at tinyurl.com/o29khx.
To comment, send email to Cash@msgroup.org.
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