Forty Minutes On Unshaded Hot Asphalt...

My area is having an early heat wave for a few days, temperatures almost 90 degrees. The other day I took a walk around the neighborhood. If I jump over speed bumps, and only briefly walk over concrete areas that can't be avoided jumping over the speed bumps, the entire walk is smooth blacktop, and some occasional spots of smooth red brick tiles, but with a couple of ouch sharper rocks even under the blacktop coating. There's even a couple of steep hills that I find easier to walk without flip flops anyway.

Out the door at 1:00pm. That's the start of the hottest afternoon hours, and today I'll probably start at 2:00pm one hour into the hottest afternoon hours. For some reason, peak afternoon hours went from 2:00pm to 4:00pm to 1:00pm to 3:00pm, after which there are stretches of shade that can't be jumped over or walked around.

Anyway... first of all, I didn't preheat the soles and I just started walking. Barely warm! Up one hill up a second hill, right turn the end of that street, back the other end of the street. Standing periodically to absorb... what heat? Disappointing. That was just the warmup of the walk, and then down the hill and right to the first street of the walk. Flat, with plenty of locations to stand on that are not up or down a hill, but nothing was too hot! Only a couple of sections felt just, ow hot enough to notice when standing, and then only with deliberate prolonged standing more than just a couple seconds, but it never got any hotter even though that heat didn't equalize, so no need for any heat relief methods. If traffic didn't go through that street, I could have stood there for minutes tolerating the constant heat, before going to the next hot section that might have even been take just a couple of steps and stand on the heat again.

One person did comment as I was walking around "you're going to burn your feet", but I just politely told them I was used to it and it was easier to walk up the hills without shoes. It wasn't a rude comment, probably not used to seeing someone walking the streets not only without shoes, but also in unshaded asphalt during the start of the hottest afternoon hours. Barefooters: there is no reason to be rude and disrespectful to a comment like that because you WILL burn your feet, either from heat or excessive friction, and they are just reminding you about it, maybe even out of concern. So, shortly before ending the conversation, I was standing still, with soles fully on the asphalt but in a moderately hot, not ow hot section, and just showed them that in an hour more when it would probably be too hot, I would just roll back between lifting the toes up and standing on the heels, then rolling to the toes with the heels up (and then only because I can't do extended heel only standing with nothing to hold onto). No further comments, they moved on, I kept walking. I can assume I won't be commented to about it again, even if it's too hot, because I already showed them what I would do, but if not then I'll just remind then I got even more used to it. I would only have to worry about comments if I got blisters, but I'm ready for that already: that's normal for taking that long of a walk when its very hot just to walk on, and they'll be tougher than ever when they are healed.

As it turns out, except for those ow hot sections that I could have done extended standing on, again because no heat relief was needed when the burning didn't equalize but didn't get to the point of too much burning, some asphalt barely felt warm, and other sections almost felt cool! Still avoided shade, jumped over speed bumps, walked exclusively on unshaded hot asphalt and the occasional brick sections all the way home. The result was not jet black coated soles. They were blackened, but many of the calluses (yes also made by grating the soles and barefooting the same day even when it wasn't hot days), were burned white enough to show through the dirt. I don't wipe my soles on blacktop unless to get a small layer of dirt on them for heat protection, but I find that there is almost no protection and just blackens the soles more than they would normally blacken anyway.

The visible damage when the soles are seen clean, well, as clean as handwipes on the soles could get them: a few abrasions where the toe pads were grated to hard to nick them, third toe on the right foot with a small cut due to a piece of glass into the toe during a step (but quickly removed), small healing blister the size of a back of a pencil erase (from too much friction during the days before hotter weather) opened up slightly, some slight tenderness of a healed cut from too much grating being scraped enough to make it red, very small hotspots that did not blister in the middle just behind the ball of the foot, and some whiteness on the ball of the foot behind the big toe and the larger callused part of the ball of the foot behind the second, third, and forth toes. Not too bad for forty minutes of hot asphalt, including some stretches of roughness on burned soles, even if not enough to be in pain when walking. Some residual tenderness, but that will resolve by this afternoon and just in time for an even hotter walk, I hope, or at least as hot as the other day and cooler. The more time I have to gradually prepare the soles for summer heat now, they more ready they will be for hottest afternoon hours barefooting without even needing pre-heating... so at most they might sting for a bit for a few tens of steps but then be burnable for quite some distance before needing a cooler surface or shade. Last summer I did 25 minutes on blacktop and sidewalk, took me 6 minutes to even get hotspots from the asphalt, but it was actually the sidewalk that finished off the hotspots to blisters because of being too abrasive... I should have stayed on the blacktop and toughed out the getting painfully burning anyway, since areas near the garages and parked cars did have shade, plus there is minimal but still some heat relief walking and standing on parking lot lines.

Of additional note is that the soles keep trying to sweat. This is obviously because they are trying to unclog the pores that are blocked by the asphalt dirt. When I feel they are getting moist enough, I towel dry the soles. Keeping them dry, periodically grated, and more frequently burned as much as possible without blisters in hotter weather helps keep the soles dry and hard.

So again, I mention that grating is an essential part of getting harder and more callused soles for me. My grating schedule is:
* 70 degrees F range to mid 80s: grate twice a day... once in the afternoon, go barefoot, once in the evening... some small amount of callus healing will occur as seen by how much faster nicks and cuts on toe pads occur when they happen. Grate again the next afternoon, go barefoot, once in the evening. No later than the next day if barefooting can't be done the same day, but still grating twice a day.
* Mid 80's to low 90's: grate once a day. Calluses need to build up more because longer durations standing can start to feel ow hot, even if it doesn't get any hotter to need heat relief. Walking is still more than doable.
* Low 90's to low 100's: grate once a week when the soles have burned so much they sting for tens of minutes and feel hot for an hour or so, otherwise every other day. High 90's the low 100's... standing on unshaded sidewalk might need heat relief, and asphalt shade will be burning hot in areas with more direct sunlight. Experience in the low 100's is that my soles did last almost 2 minutes before needing to cool the soles on sidewalk or shade... so with diligent burning, cooling, burning, cooling I should be able to walk longer distances without too quickly burning the soles... as long as I know the walk and plan in advance where the cooler spots are so I can just walk to them instead of desperately running to them. Too much burning without cooling has caused white pre-blister hotspots to appear, but not filled up yet to become actual blisters. Humidity is a factor! The asphalt becomes hotter at lower weather temperatures.
* Hotter than that? No grating! The soles are likely to even blister with too much of an unshaded walk. I have no experience with much longer distances yet, but I did last through a couple of minutes hot-footing a parking lot, walking two vendor aisles on blacktop asphalt using normal steps, and then hot-footing across the parking lot again... at an inland valley swap meet and hour before peak afternoon heat hours when those started at 2:00pm rather than 1:00pm. Desert area locations such as Las Vegas, NV (and I already know sidewalks are red colored concrete tiles that will get much hotter than white or gray tiles since I have been there three times, but not yet in summer) or Phoenix, AZ (115 to 116 degrees in hottest afternoon hours during peak summer days might make even white sidewalk tiles blistering hot) would definitely be extremely hot on the soles, so I would bring flip flops with me. Asphalt longer than a pedestrian crossing or parking lot, especially after more than enough distance on extra hot sidewalk that might keep increasing in burning every few steps, might blister the soles too soon.

All that said, It doesn't matter at the end of a barefoot walk if I do get blisters and that's just a normal part of getting the soles used to blistering heat. By then a risk of 3rd degree burns would be very minimal because of only having to put on flip flops to finish the last stretch of the walk.

 

This didn't post last time, so hopefully it's not a double-post:

This is becoming more normal almost daily. Visiting people I know in the area, I have the opportunity to check the mail. Whether or not the mail is there, I have the opportunity to walk the neighborhood streets. Almost all blacktop, with very short stretches of bricks, a couple of speed bumps, and speed bump sized concrete before and after the speed bumps or bricks. There are concrete gutters, but I only had to use those a couple of summers back when, if I measured the asphalt temperature, it was 133 degrees F and my soles weren't that heat trained just yet.

Anyway 20 to 25 minutes one way and back, 40 minutes if I extend the walk to include 10 or so minutes of intermittent standing. Almost an hour if I walk very slowly after extended standing. Standing on the bricks, but red in color and smoother, they never get ow hot, sometimes not even burning hot. Some blacktop stretches are close to ow sharp wincing, but doable at normal speed. So far, I've only located three different spots at the top of hilly streets that are at the okay-that's-hot-to-walk-on level of heat... so I could start standing there. Hot to walk on isn't burning hot, just feels, well... hot enough to feel it might get burning hot but even slow steps don't increase to burning hot yet. Those spots actually do become gradually ow hot to extended stand soles fully on the ground, but then there's still heat relief methods.

Extended standing means, as I've mentioned before... stand until the burning feeling stays the same or gets less, take two steps, it's slightly hotter (because not all the heat was relieved before taking the next two steps) so stand until the burning feeling stays the same or gets less, repeat until the point it's getting to be foot tingling, teeth gritting, and eyes starting to close from that much... then start to roll on the soles for heat relief. During one extended standing moment, I timed 4 minutes 19 seconds total, after about a 1 minute 15 seconds of standing starting to become ow hot, before even rolling on the soles was just starting to become slightly unmanageable increasing heat even though it wasn't close to ow hot. I stopped that extending standing moment only because I had 10 or so minutes left of the walk to complete. Disappointingly, nothing was even close to hot to walk on like those hot spots.

I never want blisters from just standing, although I know I can heat relief for several minutes after soles fully on the ground burning is too intense, and I still have the option of a cooler surface or shade if it's available... even if the shade is hot enough to need heat relief but doesn't increase the burning with heat relief.

And yet I still need much more training for the mid 100 degrees F range, because some desert area peak afternoon summer heat in popular vacation areas gets close enough to 115 degrees F. Longer walks on asphalt will be exorbitantly hot, sidewalk will probably excessively hot and need periodic still extremely hot shade, and even grassy areas mowed too close to the ground will be extra hot lawns. For sure I'll have socks and flip flops with me, either in hand or in a waistpack.... to put on for urgent quick-burning: socks first, and then flip flops if in socks is still excessively hot.

I never want to push to 3rd degree burns. That's foot damage, not toughening the soles to be enough like shoes they only feel at most like teeth gritting, eyes closing burning when walking longer distances without a cooler surface or shade... until the next cooler surface or shade.

 

Whoa, baby!

 

I enjoy these posts. I don't know why.

 

Next year I am going to measure the different ground temperatures here in Florida, last summer the only thing that got to hot was some dark stained wood decks around noon if there was no wind but even the darkest pavements and blacktops were not a problem for me. I really never noticed my tolerance go up, I just figured today its not that hot till I figured out that anything besides that deck never is to hot anymore and I often had people asking how I could walk on that.

Hottest place I ever went barefooting was Palm Springs California @ 117 Fahrenheit , I had to navigate wisely , concrete side walks no problem but some blacktop and those tiles by hotel were crossable but better to walk around sections like those, it burned.

I tried to fry an egg, the hottest spot in the parking lot, a patch of different material was hot enough to cook it but it completely dried out at the same time.

 

Time flys. If I can remember I will take some readings of the asphalt temperatures tomorrow afternoon.

 

Time flys like an arrow, fruit flys like banana.

 

I Assume You Bought The Digital Thermometer You Displayed Here In December....????...



Cheers Glen.

 

I have to get battery for it.

 

No Heat Problems Here.....Tis The Last Month Of Autumn And This Week We Have Had Two

Light Frosts To Give Us A Hint Of What Is Yet To Come......



Cheers Glen.

 

The deck was hot today enough to cause discomfort and top reading was 157 degrees and a low of 135, it varies a lot board to board. I don't think non barefooters would be able to stand it. Its a little breezy today and that is keeping the deck from getting to that temp where you have to get across without stopping or later in the summer when it is burning hot.

The hottest spot on the deck did hurt and I can still feel it five minutes later.

So far the streets and blacktop are not hot enough to cause any discomfort .


I looked up the temperature water causes burns,

Most adults will suffer third-degree burns if exposed to 150 degree water for two seconds. Burns will also occur with a six-second exposure to 140 degree water or with a thirty second exposure to 130 degree water. Even if the temperature is 120 degrees, a five minute exposure could result in third-degree burns.