What is the coldest temp / worst weather you ever rode in?

Well not the coldest but the worst regarding snow was back in 1971 road from near Auburn NY to just outside of Rochester NY.
To visit my girlfriend who was going to college up there on Friday on my 175 Honda. Ride up was not bad just a little cool. Then come Sunday morning it had started to snow. Spent one more night and took off for home on Monday. Roads were not too bad till I got within 15 miles of home. There were sections with 3 to 4 inches of snow on the road and much of that last part I rode with feet down for outriggers. Total distance one way is just around 60 miles.

Took a long warm shower and was still shaking for about an hour after that. Not a ride I would want to try these days, at 21 it was not that big of a deal.
 
LOL it's nice to see I'm not the only Dummy who rode in the cold.....
in the late 70's in Hamelton Montana, I rode my Suzuki 100cc about 20 miles in the snow..... to work... pealing logs with a draw knife
hard work minum pay.... I needed to get to work but the car was so low on gas if I went in I had to fill it and this was wensday .... payday was saterday..... so I filled the tank on the suzuki and bundled like I never bundled myself up before...for a ride as it was minus 7 degrees and 3" of snow on the ground.... Ice on the pavement was fairly thick but there were patches that had exposed road in them.....
I will say that is the closest to death I think I ever have been..... I think I almost froze to death ! I was so frigging cold by the time I got to work it took over an hour to warm up by the barrel stove that was roaring and red hot..... I pealed just 3 logs and I was so tired I had to give up....
bundled up and headed back home.... when I arrived i found I couldn't stand up..... couldn't open my hands and it all seamed like a distant dream....... if my dear wife hadn't been there to help me into the house I might have just passed out right there.....
.....Never again..... that was brutal and painful for the entire time.....
my bike loved it ! that cold liked the suzuki ! LOL the knobby tires on it worked real good and I found myself looking for undisturbed snow as I road along.... better traction !.....
that was the coldest ride.... the next coldest ride was coming back to Redding from Bartel ca. and working with a bunch of guys cutting christmas trees....... i was on the Honda 305 dream and it was snowing, which turned into freezing rain about 1/2 way home which was about 75 miles away..... I had Icicles on my cables.... and i had to stop several times to warm my hands on the cylinders.....
i persevered and finally dropped off the top of the hill into warmer air and it got better !....but still very very cold
my riding gear from that point on improved a great deal......
so did the helmet !.... the bubble clear face shield sucked it fogged up so bad I couldn't use it. so I covered my head with the Scarf and only had slits for my eyes and sunglasses.... which also gave me hell..... frozen raindrops on the sunglasses that I had to clean off every once in a while so I could see.
.....
I passed a guy on a BMW with a sidecar on the freeway today he was doing about 55mph and did not look like he was having fun..... it's about 40deg outside and he looked frozen !
.....
....Now days.... I don't even think about Riding in the snow ! .... ya gott'a be nuts to do that !!!!!
HA !
Bob.......
 
#3 whopper is MaxPete..................230 km distance at 27 F at a speed of 100 km/hr, is 5.7 F or minus 14.6 C wind chill

Well, I'm not going to dignify your remark with a comprehensive reply but I will say that I did wear multiple layers of clothing including leathers and I did stop a couple of times and I did have a windscreen on the bike and in reference to your remark about Canadians - I AM one of those too and I suspect that I know just as much as you do about cold weather - but not likely as much about anything else.

I will say that one of the things we Canadians are generally NOT known for is pissing on other people from a great height.

Consequently, with the greatest respect, I must tell you that I don't give a rats @ss if you believe me or not.
 
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HAHAH ! Yep the human body can withstand a great deal of Stupid ! especially in the cold.... all the blood is restricted to the core of the body so your hart don't stop..... hence frost bite.... I've never had frost bite and don't want it either , but there is a grater danger in bike riding than frost bite.... and that is exposure to extreme cold , we usually associate that to mean frost bite but you can die and be just as dead without frost bite ever setting in.... it's called Hypothermia... and you can do yourself IN very easily on a bike ....
jeans and t-shirt on a sunny day... heading out and being caught in a freak storm can do it.... when I was Young and dumb I went up to Mt. Lassen from Redding with just my jean jacket and gloves, jeans and T- shirt and the jacket and gloves were bungeed to the sissy bar.....
I got up there climbed a Hill and watched the clouds roll in and enjoyed the hell out of the waning day..... it started getting chilly so I put all I had with me on.... and headed back.... before I got home it was raining hard with flakes of snow sticking to my face shield now and then
I was colder that time than in Montana ..... I set on the bike at home , in the rain warming my hands for 10 minutes I had to sit sideways on the bike and get circulation back in my legs just so I could walk to the house.... needless to say I was soaked to the bone and extremely cold
..... if you've never done it , count yourself lucky.... DON'T DO THAT !
I am totally convinced you can Kill yourself riding on a cold day.... you might simply pass out and drive off the road or park and have a hart attack... but riding in the cold especially any distance at all is a bad thing to do.....
for Fun , yah it's a blast,..... but you can go back in the house and get warm...... but take that option away and it get's serious real quick
trust me ....I know..... and it Hurts like hell !
......
Bob......
 
Some earlier in the post said they didn't believe anyone that said they rode in the snow. Sorry buddy. In the winter of 1965 I rode my Jawa Californian to highschool in the snow. Didn't have a car. Wrapped rope around the tires and through the spokes kinda like chains. Worked pretty good. Adapt and overcome.

Later in life I rode my XS650B to work one morning in 21 degree weather when my car wouldn't start. Work was about 40 miles away. Snowmobile suit and full face helmet with a throat coat. Again adapt and overcome. Built an ice racer out of a YZ 125 Yamaha once. Lot of fun dirt trackin' and pulling wheelies on ice.
 
I hated taking the big plastic bag with me just in case I had homework and had to bring my books home in the rain.... that suked !
I lived about 20 miles away from school.... I had no car and Wouldn't ride the bus if I had to... the bike was the only reason I got to school in the first place...LOL... rain ,snow,sleet or hail I've rode in it all..... Hail is the worst ! you think ice is slippery try 1" of Hail.... you have tri-pod it the whole way !..... slicker than greased Gorilla snot !...... if you ever hit a patch of hail on the road traveling .... man slow down to 1st gear !
.....the deeper it is the more traction you have but it's still allot slicker than snow ever hoped to be !
I do not doubt the stories here.... because I did the same stupid things ..... that don't make you more manly..... it just goes to show ya we all have those stupid things that we have done ! HAHAHAHA!
..... Now days, it would take allot more than a good looking chick to get me on a bike in the cold ! HA !
Bob.......
 
MaxPete and JimD54........................Just the type of reply I expected from you. You can fool some of the people all of the time, and all of the people some of the time, but you can't fool all of the people all of the time. Yes, telling tall tales is fun, but its not reality.
 
The "230 km distance at 27 F at a speed of 100 km/hr, is 5.7 F or minus 14.6 C wind chill " is doable. Say it was 6F (with wind chill) and took four hours to ride it. People stay out in 6F working for four hours. You'd need frequent warm up breaks. You'd need good mittens with lots of fuzziness inside and good liners. Would need to seal somehow at yoiur sleeves. You'd need a carton of hand warmers. You'd need one of those antifa balaclavas on your face. Need a down vest under jacket to keep core warm. Need sweater and wool shirt and polypro long sleeve tee. Need a couple layers of polypro under pants. Need windproof boots with pants legs tucked in. Need thick wool or polypro socks. Need hoodie covering back of neck. Need Polarfleece neck thing arranged to protect Adam's apple. Helmet with good face shield.
 
Some earlier in the post said they didn't believe anyone that said they rode in the snow. Sorry buddy. In the winter of 1965 I rode my Jawa Californian to highschool in the snow. Didn't have a car. Wrapped rope around the tires and through the spokes kinda like chains. Worked pretty good. Adapt and overcome.

Later in life I rode my XS650B to work one morning in 21 degree weather when my car wouldn't start. Work was about 40 miles away. Snowmobile suit and full face helmet with a throat coat. Again adapt and overcome. Built an ice racer out of a YZ 125 Yamaha once. Lot of fun dirt trackin' and pulling wheelies on ice.
Its been about 50 years since I wrapped the rear tire of my little Yamaha 2 stroke street bike with rope, and never heard of someone else doing it. Like you said, it worked. I was so excited at age 14 to be riding a motorcycle that I simply coped with the winter cold (and bundled up). Kids will do anything for some fun. Rode the hard-packed snowmobile trails up behind the house. One day I went over the handlebars, and broke off the choke lever with my thigh; my legs were so wet and cold that I didnt notice till an hour later at home that I had badly ripped open the leg. I discovered that my brother can't stand the sight of blood; he fainted.
 
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Its been about 50 years since I wrapped the rear tie of my little Yamaha 2 stroke street bike with rope, and never heard of someone else doing it.

Another temp traction aid is heavy duty zip-ties. Used them a couple times on my work bike sidecar outfit. Problem is they don't hold up very long once the road is plowed, wear out real fast! But at least they won't cause a problem when they do come loose.

Best thing I found for running the XS 650 sidecar outfit in the snow was to source a 18 inch rear rim so I had availability of some cheep knobbies for the rear and I ran a undersized knobby on the front, not too many options in 19 inch! Those off-road knobbies sure wore down fast on the pavement!

Had to do some digging but found a picture of the outfit sitting at work!

ride-to-work.jpg
 
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RG you live in Calgary, claim you are motorcyclist but have no "epic" cold ride story to offer? hmmm........
Dealing with cold requires "Acclimation" the body can do amazing things but requires some "learning" to deal with it.
worked for years as a yard man in a small Wisconsin lumber yard. Know the drill well.
I've had "near frostbite" countless times, my foot circulation ain't great these days. Kinda wonder how low my core temp has gone.... Like Bob says at low body temps mind and muscle become very ineffective.
Last winter, full moon, Temp "about" zero F, About 8PM dressed warmly and hiked to the bluff tops at Devil's Lake State Park, the snow was stiff so much of the hike was just "through the woods" Gorgeous view looking down from the bluff top in the moonlight but my phone camera was not able to record it. About 3 hours round trip, not an issue with the cold.
Winter 1987-88 I was building a big ass log house and spent that "good old fashioned Wisconsin Winter" working outdoors framing it. Weeks of brutal cold. Every day dark to dark. It required a serious devotion to eating to keep up with the energy expended. The next summer I ballooned up to 190 before I shut my mouth.
Pics from that winter, on a hill top it was breezy up there.
the macho macho man pic, me, new years day 1988. I spent the day by myself getting that log behind me up in place.
wife brought lunch, soda froze solid before I could drink it.
Madison WI Friday, January 1, 1988
Temperature
Mean Temperature 0 °F
Max Temperature 7 °F
Min Temperature -6 °F
DSCN8435.JPG
DSCN8436.JPG

Log but with 2x6" framed walls, half logs inside and out, I don't think log walls alone are enough for a Wisconsin winter.
Wife has done the 35 miles Birkie ski race for ten years. She's "not fast" takes her about 7 hours. The worst year she slept in the van, sub zero temps outdoors, not much better in the van, then got up dressed and raced, There are about 8,000 skiers, She starts at 9AM, high for the day was 7 F! and there was wind too. relatively thin clothes, cause she's skiing. Many quit, many were treated for frost bite. Those with "Guy parts" are at extreme risk in cross country skiing. She suffered but got r done. Guess my point is you CAN deal with extreme cold, but it is time limited and calorie intensive.
For motorcycling it's not the temp or even the windchill it's the lack of activity. Aside from shivering, "in place" calisthenics help a lot to use muscle energy to help keep extremities warm.

The Itditarod.....1,000 miles by dog sled over 11 days, It can be done.
How bad can it get out there? The coldest temperature ever recorded on the Iditarod trail during a race was in 1973 when the temp with wind chill dipped to an unfathomable -130 degrees F. The 2015 race saw some of the coldest conditions of recent memory, as witnessed by the twins' thermometer... And remember, that won't include the frigid impact of wind chill.

8018770.png


OK enough "story telling"
 
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Kshanson :thumbsup: :cheers:
I keep a collapsible snow shovel and chunk of climbing rope in my car and van both for a tow (give more than get) and to lace around a wheel/tire for self rescue.
OK one more LOL As a mailman I dreaded the outdoor mail boxes for the trailerparks, a couple hundred boxes at a time, standing outside, can only wear fingerless wool gloves while working a key collection, beat up old doors and latches, sorting mail and packages into mailboxes and parcel lockers. Shudder just thinking about it. Mail trucks don't have great heaters and the window's down all day.
 
Man all of you living in the frozen North are a tough breed! Here in the desert we take jackets to restaurants with us because the air conditioning is too cold! :lmao:
Here’s what you guys need for your bikes.
F38B5816-FC79-400D-BBE4-F31CB91691BA.jpeg

And Gary....this is not my idea of fun!
65AB36A7-8814-48A8-B576-FDB7AF2528BF.jpeg

Seriously though, where I carried mail heat stroke is a very real danger. Sustained physical exertion in 110 plus degrees just wipes you out. I have nodded off when I stopped at a mailbox before! :whistle:
 
My son Eric's last day working before he & then GF took off for a year in New Zealand.
He'd borrowed my XS11 sidecar rig to haul all his stuff home.
2 weeks before Xmas in Saskatoon, 4" of new snow and perhaps 2º below freezing at quitting time.
Perhaps 8pm or so we got the phone call, "We have gotten Eric far too drunk to drive, could you come and fetch him, please?"
My wife & I drove down to fetch him but guess who was tasked to ride the rig home?
All across town in the dark in the snow at (by that time) 10º below freezing.
Even wearing my down-filled snowmobile mitts I thought my fingers had fallen off.
Luckily I was only 70 years old at the time. These days I'd have phoned a beavertail towtruck.
 
Kshanson :thumbsup: :cheers:
I keep a collapsible snow shovel and chunk of climbing rope in my car and van both for a tow (give more than get) and to lace around a wheel/tire for self rescue.

More that a few times a winter I would get to the quarry and get stuck by the front gate as I was always the first one there on a snowy morning. I would then walk he 500 feet to the shop and climb in the skid-steer to plow the road enough so others could get in. I would plow around the sidecar outfit then carefully "nudge" it out of the snow bank with the skid-steer. Climb out of the skid-steer and ride outfit up to shop and walk back down to finish plowing the road.
 
the best Cold weather riding outfit I ever had was....
full-face helmet with 3 face shields, amber,clear and dark green.
heavy leather bomber jacket with good lining that fit really good.
Gauntlet Mittens, and gauntlet gloves, ( the Mittens had electric heat from a d-cell battery that didn't last too long)
thermal underwear,(long-johns) heavy lined jeans, and leather chaps zipped tight at the ankles.
a long wool sweater under the jacket, a scarf, with a black -lava throat protector over it.
2 pairs of wool socks. thermally insulated boots, or snow-mobile boots.
..... all the leather was coated with Vaseline, and was completely waterproof.and supple.
I could ride from My house in Big Bend,CA, to My Mom's Ranch when the Roads were dry and free of snow in 30 minutes in spite of the low temperatures in the teens and arive there only chilled... not frozen completely.
the hardest places to keep the cold out is the neck,chin area and the joint where the jacket meets the pants/chaps at the waste.
I could usually tighten the belt buckle on the jacket bottom and get that air-leak stopped but the , chin and nose always got too cold,
hence the scarf up over the nose....
my legs stayed fairly warm with the big V-Twin 1100cc Honda Shadow, but I was ever diligent at watching for black Ice
( snow melt that ran across the road and re-froze.)
a 45 min drive in the car but only 30 min on the bike.... I made that ride many, many times to help Mom on the Ranch.
what got me was the $10.00 to $15.00 to fill the gas tank !!!!! and I had to go get gas first usually....another 20 miles..lol
.....by the time your all bundled up and ready to go ... you discover you gott'a Pee..... it's inevitable ! it always happens!
LOL
....Bob........
 
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