I have a new web application that loads slowly if it's not used for about an hour.  If you try and access it after that it takes about 20 seconds to load the first time and after that it's ok.  The log files and developer dashboard reveal it's trying to validate a certificate for 19 seconds when this happens.  The message is, "SPCertificateValidator.Validate" and "Build the X509Chain".  

I performed the steps in this KB article and they didn't help: https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/kb/2639348

It tries to do this validation about 10 times in a row.  The site is only internal right now and doesn't even have an SSL certificate added to it so I'm not sure why this keeps happening.  Any help would be great.

This is normal. What you're experiencing is known as JIT lag, where the Application Pool has spun down and now needs to be spun up again, performing a Just-In-Time compile of the assemblies that are being used on that particular page. Given how large the primary assembly, Microsoft.SharePoint.dll is, this long 'load' time the first time you hit the page is expected.

Hi Trevor,

I would expect that to happen once a day but this happens nearly every hour or sometimes even more frequently.  What's really odd is we have 2 other web applications running that this doesn't happen to.  

Do your SharePoint servers have HTTP access to the Internet? .NET, by default, will validate binaries that are code signed, which may be what you're also describing. This is performed by calling http://crl.microsoft.com when a binary is loaded.

Like Trevor asked, if your WFEs dont/cant have access to the internet then you might want to add an entry to your hostfile that resolves crl.microsoft.com (or mscrl.microsoft.com for Server 2012 I think) to the loopback so you dont have to wait for the time out each time.

Thanks for the suggestions guys, unfortunately I'm still facing the issue.  The server does have the ability to reach the Internet and I also tried editing the HOSTS file with the crl addresses.

I've included a screenshot of the problem tracked by the developer dashboard.  The right column shows the milliseconds for how long it's taking.  I'm stumped on this one.