I’m doing a sprint race on saturday and the high for the day is supposed to be 103. Should I lose the aero helmet in favor of a cooler helmet?
Um, my guess would be yes.
For a sprint you should be fine. Of course, the only way to verify this is with testing, maybe try a lunchtime ride in the heat with it on?
Do you plan on being on the course at the hottest part of the day? Most races here start at 7 or 8 in the morning…
I’m asking myself the same question. I’m doing the Muskoka sprint (Saturday afternoon, 4pm start, forcasted high of 25C or 77F)… I sweat big time, so would that kind of heat be bad? I’m also considering ditching the wetsuit.
Sounds like the weather this weekend in St George for the Utah Summer Games tri…i say don’t wear your aero helmet because i want to have as much of an advantage as possible against everyone else. Just kidding. The mornings are still really nice/comfortable so i would stick with the aero helmet. If you are doing the race in St George do you happen to know the approx water temp?..i have tried finding it online, but the only website i found has not been updated since April.
Yeah it is the summer games tri. On the late night news on sunday the water temp was 73.
high of 77F? hee, hee, I rarely do a race where the start temp is much lower than that. You’ll be fine in a sprint with an aero helmet with temps in the 70’s in my opinion. I did a race last summer with a bike leg a little over an hour. Both temp and humidity were in the high 80’s at the start of the race and no problem with the helmet. By the end of the run the temp was well into the 90’s. I actually don’t notice much difference between the aero and regular helmet.
Use the aero helmet. I raced a sprint Saturday in Birmingham and packed my Rocket and Pneumo, just not sure how bad the heat would be. I used the Rocket and did not have any heat issues. I think it was about 85 by the time I got off the bike. At high enough speeds there is plenty of airflow to keep your head cool.
One thing I noticed was the helmet wanting to lift on descents over 35mph. Anybody else ever feel this? I could feel the tail hitting my back but it felt like the whole helmet was trying to rise up off my head.
Hamner, the extra “lift” is intentional. It was designed to reduce rolling resistance by reducing contact with the road 
I’ve never had problems with my Rocket at high speeds. It does get pretty loud over 30, though.
To the original poster, I say go aero. Especially in a short (sprint) tri, you should be going fast enough to get some good flow through the helmet. With the dry heat in St. George, you should be ok. This assumes that you’ve used the helmet enough times to feel comfortable in it, of course.
And good luck at USG. I’d be doing it too, but I moved to Texas a few months ago.