Author Topic: Riding when you have a cold (Read 4628 times)

bikey-mikey · « **Reply #25 on:** 30 April, 2012, 12:38:00 pm »

Quote from: andrewc on 30 April, 2012, 09:27:48 am

Currently on the 2nd day of a 2 week tour of Scotland. My nose is running like a tap, I've got a sore throat & am coughing up green slime :-(

This is wrong, holidays are supposed to be fun!

If you ride your bike all day, and dump the green stuff by the road, you save lots of money on tissues.

Biggsy · « **Reply #26 on:** 30 April, 2012, 06:11:25 pm »

Blowing snot is a messy business when you've got a cold. Instead of releasing a rocket*, you get a uncontrollable dangling string of thick mucus. I just got some on my rim.

* that is little more than water when I don't have a cold.

Ian H · « **Reply #27 on:** 30 April, 2012, 09:56:20 pm »

I was once the Mean Green Snot Machine. Great Eastern 1000, 1995.

teethgrinder · « **Reply #28 on:** 01 May, 2012, 11:35:58 pm »

It's very satisfying cycling in the gutter, when you can snot a greeny over the white line onto the other side of the road.

The worst ones are the January Hangers. You snot out a long, slimy bogey but can't shake the bugger off, so you have to ride along sticking your head out to the side and shaking it. Sometimes you have to use a gloved finger to remove it from the nose and flick it onto the road. Always have one glove for snot and the other for sweat. Otherwise you get a snotty face when you wipe your sweaty brow.

Peter · « **Reply #29 on:** 02 May, 2012, 12:03:39 am »

Come on chaps, a little decorum, please!

teethgrinder · « **Reply #30 on:** 02 May, 2012, 12:10:49 am »

s'not me!

Feline · « **Reply #31 on:** 02 May, 2012, 12:23:22 am »

I can't do snot rockets. I have tried twice and epically failed. I use a tissue

bikey-mikey · « **Reply #32 on:** 02 May, 2012, 12:35:02 pm »

I finished the whole four days and over 900 kms with the head cold - conditions were pretty extreme as well - my conclusions are that it is OK to ride with a cold as long as you keep heart rate low and eat and drink more, and stop more often, especially if you need to cough.

Biggsy · « **Reply #33 on:** 02 May, 2012, 12:38:23 pm »

Quote from: Feline on 02 May, 2012, 12:23:22 am

I can't do snot rockets. I have tried twice and epically failed. I use a tissue

I'm not able to carry enough tissues. How do you normally treat a monkey with rhinitis, Feline?

zigzag · « **Reply #34 on:** 02 May, 2012, 12:40:38 pm »

Quote from: teethgrinder on 01 May, 2012, 11:35:58 pm

<...>
Sometimes you have to use a gloved finger to remove it from the nose and flick it onto the road. Always have one glove for snot and the other for sweat. Otherwise you get a snotty face when you wipe your sweaty brow.

armpits are a good place to get the remaining snot off the thumbs..

clarion · « **Reply #35 on:** 02 May, 2012, 12:51:11 pm »

Olbas oil on your clothes (and waved under your nose when you stop) is very effective at reducing snot.

Snot rockets are disgusting! We're not foopballers, FFS!

Biggsy · « **Reply #36 on:** 02 May, 2012, 12:56:46 pm »

Quote from: clarion on 02 May, 2012, 12:51:11 pm

Olbas oil on your clothes (and waved under your nose when you stop) is very effective at reducing snot.

Nothing is effective for me.

Quote

We're not foopballers, FFS!

No, I don't have thousands of people watching me.

LittleWheelsandBig · « **Reply #37 on:** 02 May, 2012, 06:47:35 pm »

Given the enormous volumes produced (my body is a machine, with a total loss lubrication system), snot rockets are the only sensible option. Riding at a decorous pace for 20 minutes on the Bromption in cold weather will totally fill a handkerchief. YMMV

teethgrinder · « **Reply #38 on:** 02 May, 2012, 07:00:26 pm »

Quote from: LittleWheelsandBig on 02 May, 2012, 06:47:35 pm

Given the enormous volumes produced (my body is a machine, with a total loss lubrication system), snot rockets are the only sensible option. Riding at a decorous pace for 20 minutes on the Bromption in cold weather will totally fill a handkerchief. YMMV

Me too. I can saturate an industrial paper tissue of about a square foot in 2 or 3 good snots. I'd need a large saddlebag to carry enough tissues for a weekend ride.
I usualy eject the main bulk and clean up with a tissue (or glove)

Feline · « **Reply #39 on:** 02 May, 2012, 08:46:49 pm »

Quote from: Biggsy on 02 May, 2012, 12:38:23 pm

Quote from: Feline on 02 May, 2012, 12:23:22 am
I can't do snot rockets. I have tried twice and epically failed. I use a tissue

I'm not able to carry enough tissues. How do you normally treat a monkey with rhinitis, Feline?

From a good safe distance, obv!

rob · « **Reply #40 on:** 03 May, 2012, 07:54:02 pm »

Quote from: Ian H on 30 April, 2012, 09:56:20 pm

I was once the Mean Green Snot Machine. Great Eastern 1000, 1995.

I believe I cooked you dinner at Fishlake. Might have been breakfast.

I have no recollection of the snot, though.

Jaded · « **Reply #41 on:** 03 May, 2012, 08:23:51 pm »

Not even the delight of some unexpected Hollandaise sauce?

bikey-mikey · « **Reply #42 on:** 03 May, 2012, 10:04:19 pm »

When a car comes too close on a pass, it's great if you are all loaded up and can get their window!! Proves they were too close as well...

hellymedic · « **Reply #43 on:** 03 May, 2012, 11:14:34 pm »

Quote from: rob on 03 May, 2012, 07:54:02 pm

Quote from: Ian H on 30 April, 2012, 09:56:20 pm
I was once the Mean Green Snot Machine. Great Eastern 1000, 1995.

I believe I cooked you dinner at Fishlake. Might have been breakfast.

I have no recollection of the snot, though.

I drank tins of rice pudding at Fishlake at the end of that ride.
Well, I hope it was rice pudding...

Auntie Helen · « **Reply #44 on:** 05 May, 2012, 06:54:48 am »

I'm on my Berlin to London ride at the moment (solo, unsupported) and developed a sore throat after the first day. I rather hoped it was hayfever (which I haven't previously had - but I was cycling past enormous fields of oilseed rape) but it has turned into a cold.

It's been mega warm and sunny here in Germany which has made having a cold less annoying but today is the first day of rain and the cold is now mostly runny nose and chesty cough. I have just 42 miles to do today which should help, hopefully, and the forecast is better for tomorrow. I assume if I take it easy and refuel with plenty of cake I shouldn't do myself any harm.

ferret · « **Reply #45 on:** 07 May, 2012, 09:31:07 am »

Ok so after a week of fighting a loosing battle, eating echinacea and vitamin c like smarties I have sucked my way through untold packets of Hall's
and the odd fishermans friend, I got round the Lumpy Scrumpy ok, well actually more than ok none of those sudden hot sweats for no reason,
finished the ride got home did feel very tied though, did a few odd jobs to help the OH and hit the sack about 9 ish, that was Saturday, yesterday I could feel my chest and throat going, you know the feeling, you swallow and it feels like there's something sticking in the back of your throat, you breath in and your chest burns, well I've dragged my carcass out of bed this morning my chest feels like it's on fire my lungs don't exist and I'm convinced some one has hit me on the head with a sledge hammer, I've broken in to my emergency ventolin, first time in months oh well I suppose it will all be over in a few days, may be the sun will shine by then

bikey-mikey · « **Reply #46 on:** 07 May, 2012, 10:24:32 am »

Quote from: ferret on 07 May, 2012, 09:31:07 am

Ok so after a week of fighting a loosing battle, eating echinacea and vitamin c like smarties I have sucked my way through untold packets of Hall's
and the odd fishermans friend, I got round the Lumpy Scrumpy ok, well actually more than ok none of those sudden hot sweats for no reason,
finished the ride got home did feel very tied though, did a few odd jobs to help the OH and hit the sack about 9 ish, that was Saturday, yesterday I could feel my chest and throat going, you know the feeling, you swallow and it feels like there's something sticking in the back of your throat, you breath in and your chest burns, well I've dragged my carcass out of bed this morning my chest feels like it's on fire my lungs don't exist and I'm convinced some one has hit me on the head with a sledge hammer, I've broken in to my emergency ventolin, first time in months oh well I suppose it will all be over in a few days, may be the sun will shine by then

Shame but it will be over soon. I'm still living on lockets and coughs produce light green blancmange looking harbingers of evil, henceforth to be called LGBLHE. Cleaning my bike took all my energy so god knows how I am still riding... If only I had a log fire....