Winds are NOT like hills.

For starters, the harder you push, the harder the wind pushes back.

Secondly, light hill-climbers are at an even greater disadvantage against the wind; your reduced mass is pushed around more, and while your power-to-weight may be really great, pure power might be relatively low. On a flat road in a headwind, this equals serious pain.

I know about this. At 138lbs but with a pretty decent power-to-weight, I usually kill my riding buddies on hills. But I remember when I moved to TX I just could not hang with some of those TX power-riders on flat roads on windy days.

Even now in Kansas, the guys I ride with/against usually find a way to peel me off on a flat road with a headwind, so they won't have to fight me up hill. (Yes, there are some climbs in NE Kansas. My normal route is 26miles with almost 2k of climbing, most of that on about 2 fairly steep climbs.)

I agree. As a big legged somewhat generously portioned person, I love the flats. Even without particularly strong wind, I seem to drop the light hill climbers without even trying. I rode with some good climbers back in the UK and on the flats coming up to the start of hills, I sometimes looked back and found they weren't there.

Just ride like there is no wind. Seriously. It works.

The standard aphorism that I tell the folks I coach in my Club's group riding skills series every Spring is:

"Don't try to fight Geology (hills) or Meteorology (wind), they've had 4 billion years more practice than you."

iow, if you are confronted with a headwind, maintain your perceived effort, not your actual power output. Slow down; don't fight it, you'll just lose.

(Note, that applies to group riding. If you're riding solo and want to get a killer workout, go ahead and try to fight the headwind. Knock yourself out.)

You can still be putting out the same power, but not traveling as fast, right?

There is a law in biking,It's this {Whichever way you turn,the wind will change and become a head wind**

Good question for the PM folks. What does your equipment tell you? Power = force X velocity, right? So pedaling into a 30 mph wind, you maybe have a velocity of 10 mph. Force (RPE) is the same as doing about 30 but because of lower frictional losses you actually have a 40 mph headwind. So your PM should say about 1/3 of your usual still air power at 30, right? Something like that anyway. I'm making some assumptions with a large range of inaccuracy.

The wind is your friend and training partner for it makes you a stronger rider.

Embrace the wind, make it your friend.

You can use the on-line calculators but it's much easier to pedal 10mph into a 30mph wind than it is to ride 30mph with no wind. I think that's what you were saying except if by RPE you meant perceived exertion it's proportional to power output not the aero drag force.

One other note regarding wind speeds and using on-line calculators, the reported wind speeds are measured higher above the ground than bicycle height. So a 30mph reported wind speed will actually produce lower wind speed on the ground.

thats comparing 30 mph to 40 mph.

It depends on your power output. For some of us slowing down to 18 kph would be a storm and the ferries would have to stop running.

I'm not following.

10 mph into a 30 mph headwind = an apparent headwind of 40 mph. versus cycling 30 mph with no wind = an apparent headwind of 30 mph.

Yes, the point is it's much easier to ride 10mph into an apparent headwind of 40 than 30mph into an apparent headwind of 30.

Maybe, but it's close. Obviously at higher speeds frictional resistance is a much larger percentage of the total. I've been steady at LT at 10 mph, full tuck on the aero bars, pulling my hill leader on the flat. Didn't have a wind-speed meter, but from sailing I guessed it as about 30 and an apparent of 40. Even a small difference in estimated wind speed makes a major difference, from the law of squares, so I could have been wrong about the wind speed by say 5 mph.

But what I want to know is what does your PM say when you're doing that? Do you get 300w-400w at 10 mph? Because physics says you shouldn't. Reductio, if you were in a wind where you could hardly turn the cranks, the PM should say near zero, regardless of RPE.

Use the on-line calculators and you'll see.

It's true thAt the drag force goes up with the square of apparent wind velocity, but your actual velocity is much lower. P = F x velcity (actual not apparent wind speed).