Ventilation (VE) climbs steadily throughout prolonged heavy exercise. While this VE "drift" has implications for the adequacy of gas exchange in long-term exercise, its mechanism remains unknown. We examined the behavior of previously proposed mediators of VE drift during one hour of cycle ergometer exercise at constant work rate requiring 2/3 VO2 max in 10 subjects. VE increased 13% from 12 to 61 min of exercise (P less than 0.05). Although body core temperature rose as VE rose, equal elevation of core temperature by passive means failed to increase exercise VE. Rising VE during the hour of exercise occurred despite unchanged arterial pH, PCO2, and lactate and despite unchanged VCO2. Thus, all of the VE increase was calculated to be due to increased dead space ventilation (VD). Tidal volume (VT) was unchanged, while VD/VT rose from 0.16 to 0.24 from 12 to 61 min of work (P less than 0.05). These results show that increased body core temperature does not mediate VE drift, and that changes in previously proposed mediators (arterial pH, arterial lactate, and VCO2) are not necessary for a slow VE rise to occur in prolonged heavy exercise.