Not a passive aggressive comment, just curious where you live so I can better understand your perspective.

---

---

Save: $50 on Speed Hound Recovery Boots | $20 on Air Relax| $100 on Normatec| 15% on Most Absorbable Magnesium

Blogs: Best CHEAP Zwift / Bike Trainer Desk | Theragun G3 vs $140 Bivi Percussive Massager | Normatec Pulse 2.0 vs Normatec Pulse | Speed Hound vs Normatec | Air Relax vs Normatec | Q1 2018 Blood Test Results | | Why HED JET+ Is The BEST value wheelset

Why not run and ride outside?
A benefit of Austin is I get to train outside year round.

I had to come back to this and let you know I did that and the results were hilarious. At first she was totally confused at how this could even exist as an option. I kept saying that if the garage was "completely fine", then why not move our bedroom in there instead. She said there was no bathroom in there. I said there actually is a bathroom just around the corner in the hall. She said there are no closets for our clothes. I said there is tons of room, let's build closets out there. She said it's not very nice out there, I said if you think it's nice enough for me to spend a lot of my favorite time out there, then it's surely nice enough for us to move our bedroom out there instead. She asked what we would do with the master bedroom and I said easy, we'll turn it into a bigger training room!

She eventually caught on to my game and told me to cut it out, but it was a lot of fun while it lasted. :)

Why does she need the spare bedroom? I put a queen Murphy bed in my spare bedroom. When we have guests I put my weight bench and bike in closet, bed goes down. I also took out the carpet, and put in Luxury vinyl tile that's waterproof.

When I was a kid I helped my dad close in the garage to make a living room. He added duct work to the existing system because our unit could handle it. It has worked for over 20 years. Just get a large fan and close off the vent when not using the pain cave. Mini split system is great too

Hahahahahhaha..... That's great!

Fans and riding with the doors open before the sun comes up could be an option

Mini split is the way to go. I did this in my garage and it cools it down in a hurry and my garage is pretty large with tall ceilings. Garage door, walls, and ceiling are insulated. We've made the garage like another living space with nice epoxy floor, couch, big TV, training areas for bike, treadmill, weights, etc. Open the doors when it's nice, but the mini split will get it comfortable any time of year in 10-15 minutes. I bought the system online and installed it myself and it's been running perfect for 6 years. It's definitely a pretty advanced DYI project with electrical, running/brazing copper tubing, etc., but it's not rocket science. Cost me less than half buying it online compared to what the local HVAC dealers wanted for the same system with install. The systems are super efficient, variable speed compressor for AC and heat pump for heat.

one other thing .. what direction does your garage face?

Mine faces West. So my portable unit does a great job during the day getting the garage cool. But it gets so hot in the evening that it struggles to get the temp down overnight. Just something else to consider as you move forward with this. There will be times it is more difficult to keep the garage cooler. Just might not be the same as with the rest of the house.

Short answer, yes it is possible as long as you put enough cooling tons, as someone mentioned, insulation will have a significant impact on the sizing of the system. I would also worry about air quality so some ventilation is also a good idea. Also figure out where to drain condensate from the coil, you can deal with a condensate pump.

A bit cruel from the mrs. to suggest it anyways ;-)

You don’t want to “heat train” at the expense of a quality workout. If the body is working too hard to cool itself, then your muscles won’t be able to perform what you want them to, and you will not get the muscular adaptation the workout is designed for. Your workouts should be cool and comfortable, and if you want to heat train, go and sit in a sauna after. Same thing with altitude training. Train low altitude, live/sleep high altitude.

Correct not at the expense of finishing a workout. Though there have been studies that show benefits to a 90 min heat training session creating similar effects to altitude acclimation.
http://www.acsm.org/...ude-heat-acclimation

Also if he lives in Texas the chances that he will be racing in 90 degree temps at some point are pretty high.

Another Texan here, from Houston, and my garage is fully insulated with a dedicated A/C / heater unit. It is AWESOME. My garage basically feels like an extension of the house. One initial thing is to set your expectations. The garage is never going to be as cool or comfortable as your house in the Texas summer, unless you throw a lot of money at it. But you can make it a lot better.

The plan of attack should be to focus on insulation first. Otherwise you're fighting a battle you'll never win. Walls, ceilings, and the garage door. I used Reflectix (foil bubble insulation) on my garage doors, and it helped a ton. My garage doors get full afternoon sun, and the Reflectix dropped the interior surface temp of the garage doors from 120 degree to around 100.

Also check for gaps around your garage door and seal those with foam. You can do it in a way that doesn't affect operation of the door. You just need to get rid of the gaps.

A/C wise, a split system as recommended above is your best bet. Reducing humidity alone will make the garage a lot more comfortable.

If you look at formulas for how much A/C you need per square feet, I would multiple that by 1.5 for a garage, particularly if your garage is detached. Garages aren't insulated as well as the main house, and the garage door will let in a lot of heat and outside air. Plus, if you leave the A/C off and then want to cool the garage down, you'll appreciate the extra capacity to cool things down quicker. For comparison, my garage is 1500 square feet and has a 3 ton unit. It's about right.

Couple of practical considerations, if you add A/C:

- I always leave my garage A/C on just to keep the humidity down. Nothing too cool, but letting it run a little each day in the summer makes the garage MUCH more comfortable, and the A/C has to work less if you decide you want it even cooler. I have mine on a timer, so it drops the temp at night and then lets it go a little higher during the day (76 at night and 83 during the day, at the peak of summer). I use my bike trainer in the garage in the morning, so the garage is always comfortably cool when I'm on the trainer.

- If you're going to want the garage extra cool on a particular day, or all day, you should turn it down the night before. The A/C won't have to work as hard because of the cooler overnight temps. Also keep in mind that the A/C isn't just cooling down the air in the garage, but it also needs to cool down every single item in the garage too. If it's hot in there, so are your car, your tools, and everything else. All of those things will have to be cooled down as well.

Those of us in Texas do not need to create artifical methods for heat exposure. We consider a 90 degree day a nice respite from the actual hot days.

On the other hand, getting enough cooling to not suffer performance loss on hard workouts is a much bigger challenge. I do my ftp/sst/tempo workouts in 95+ from April to September. After April the dew point+temp is still well above 150 at 4am.

It’s hard for me to escape the heat in southeast Louisiana. So I get it. I’ve done long workouts in 110+ heat index thinking I was getting prepared for hot races. When all it did was give me a crappy workout and limit my potential. So I’m moving away from that strategy and when I want to “heat adapt”, I’ll spend 3 weeks in the sauna, stressing THAT part of my nervous system so it can adapt and acclimate to cooling itself in hot environments.

I think back to workouts I completed successfully in the heat, and wonder how much better/stronger I could have been or pushed had I not been limited by the heat.

As a Dallas based athlete, I've done similar and I completely agree. I run at lunch and bike after work---both outside in the heat.

Getting out of the heat is the hard part. Heck, even indoors our heat index (heat + dew point) is higher than a lot of other places outside.

Careful with those kind of statements around ST!

Hahaha.

I got the pitchforks and tar and feathers after me. You might be next.

Im going to guess a cold part of Germany or something like that. Im in Tucson right now for winter, I would love to see this gentleman try to convince the locals to go green and just turn up the ceiling fan!

---

Professional Athlete: http://jordancheyne.wordpress.com/ http://www.strava.com/athletes/145340

Coaching Services:http://www.peakformcoaching.com/