117F 20mph w/30mph gusts headwind feels special - a common summer commute condition

Competitively I like wind (and heat) as they seem to affect others more than they affect me.

All of this is nothing compared to my area where some stretches always have a headwind no matter which direction we ride.

We have the same issue in OK, but he is right. Sometimes you just ride 10mph. We had an organised ride here where I was going downhill and could not get in the big ring since it was in a 45mph headwind. It was torture but a better and harder workout than I expected. Work hard and we get stronger. (remember, we don't have the same hills here in the flatlands)

I'm not posting any misinformation here, so I guess you take issue with me assuming that others might have initially thought the same way as I did?

To summarize: I incorrectly assumed that a constant wind on an out and back course would have less effect than it actually does. I thought about it and did some reading, and understood why I was wrong. I posted my thoughts and a link for others that might have been curious about the subject.

Despite my acknowledgement that my initial assumption was incorrect and an attempt to provide the correct information to any others that might be curious, you decided it was appropriate to mock me for thinking the way that I did ( even though I had already stated that I realized it was incorrect ).

Are you arguing that I shouldn't have thought that way in the first place? Do you instantly know everything there is to know about a subject when you are first introduced to it?

Sometimes tone is lost or confused on the internet, I doubt he meant to mock you.

Correct. Something can be intuitive to one person and not another. To me it is innately obvious, sorry if it isn't to the OP.

As bad as 25-40mph headwinds are (that's all I've seen), you don't know what a workout is until you've done a few miles in 10+ inches of snow. You'll wish you were dead.

All of this might be a moot point if we keep mucking up the planet: https://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20090610/...inishing_winds

(Before the flames begin (global warming play on words), I know that these are tentative findings and reported in a second party source; but upon seeing this in the morning, I thought immediately of this thread)

Well that just blows. Good for me though, I hate wind.

80F or 90F wind doesn't bother me nearly as much as a 35F wind does.

Or loose sand.

i like riding in the wind on hot days. it never feels hot. only when i stop do i realise how hot the day is.

where i normally ride, it always feels like coming back i am riding into a headwind but going out there was no tailwind. it's just not fair.

Something that interests me in this equation is who suffers more -- little guys like me who blow around like leaves, or big guys with more "windage?"

In my experience, big guys (or girls) come out on top because they compensate with power. They even seem at an advantage with a tailwind too, 'cause they have more "sail area."

I might be good in the hills but I sure suck in the wind. And it always blows on the coast!

oh boo hoo. we big'uns suffer more. the suffering on climbs always out weigh any other advantage in situtations where to be disadvantage does not result in pain.

Have you ever even ridden on a hot day? 75F doesn't count as "hot."

my poor sunburnt neck says you are very unkind.

All I know about wind (and the @$%*#@! wind we have here in MN seemingly all the time):

- It's a workout going into it.
- It's a blast with it at your back.

As long as a burn my calories for the ride (my primary goal) I don't care which....although the speed with a good 25mph constant MN tailwind is really a blast. Nothing like matching that fast wind at 20+ mph and barely hearing any wind rush as you pedal, looking down and seeing 25 mph on the speedo. Greatest feeling in the world....for this amateur noob anyway.

When I get the itch to race I'll probably care more.

As long as you are moving faster than the air it is best to be as small an aerodynamic as possible. "sail area" only helps if you are moving slower than the wind, i.e. going 20 with a 30 mph tailwind...

Exactly.

I didn't look at the tool, but the formula I've used since I was a kid is basically that the wind helps you for just over 90 degrees. It hurts you through most of the arc (sidewinds really slow you down) and even a wind coming from partially behind can either be no help or a hindrance.

This is not correct. Play with an online calculator, or do the math yourself.

(At least as far as _wind_ is concerned. Eventually, as speeds increase due to a strong tailwind, rolling and bearing resistances become much more important.)


Cubed of the speed increase. Actually, square of the relative (to the wind) speed increase times speed increase. Regardless, what it means is that _at the same power_ the relative decrease in wind with a tail wind helps you more than the head wind hurts you. You have to look at the inverse relationship to what you suggested.

This is ironic.

This is not necessarily bad. A side wind _might_ actually increase your speed. (Theoretically, as in the whole "negative drag" can o' worms, though the numbers linked to earlier from Sheldon Brown show that sidewinds are worse than the equivalent headwind component. Though this set of data does not account for any streamlining or dimpled wheels, to my knowledge.)

All I wrote was that "wind oesn't affect each direction equally either". I did not mean by "yes" to imply that I agreed with Kotts entire post (I must admit I did not actually read it very carefully), I was just aknowledging that there was more to the discussion.

wind sucks ... err ... blows


whatever.

My bad. I _did_ think it was strange you missed something blindingly obvious.

On paper or in a computer model, maybe. But I've had yet to experience this myself or meet a rider who didn't dislike sidewinds. Side winds catch clothing, the cyclist, spokes, you name it. This means they'll increase the amount of wind you need to push.

One other thing that is completely left out of wind calculations is the fact that neither wind speed nor direction is constant which will cause rider speed and cadence to vary even if you are a clicker. This is less efficient.