Distance: 6.75
Pace: 9:38
Spread
between what the weather app told me and reality: -18 degrees
It is
December 29 and I haven’t worked out since a 7 mile run on Christmas day. I’ve been skiing with Slo Jo and sledding,
but I count that as playing, not cardio. (I believe Slo Jo would quibble with me on the
skiing, but I’m sort of crazy, so there you go.) I am also up in the mountains without my
scale, so all I have to judge myself by is how I feel. And I.
Feel. Fat. So I decide to go for an 8 mile run. I check my weather app, which allows me to
view the predicted temperature by hour for the next several hours. It is 3:30 in the afternoon and it tells me
that the temp will hover in the mid-40s for the next three hours. I know from prior mountain experiences that
mid-40s means running tights and a short sleeved shirt. More than anything, I loathe overheating
while running and my internal temp skews warm.
I put on my running tights and my Tough Mudder finisher shirt and threw
in some gloves because it looked a little windy.
(See? This is what my weather app said! Totally reasonable running weather.)
I started my
new Jack Reacher audiobook and began the long slow chug up the Beast. As I neared the top of the Beast, I realized
I hadn’t heard MapMyRun tell me my pace, which it is supposed to do every 5
minutes. Then I realized I was past the
spot where it typically tells me I’m one mile into my run. Crap.
I checked the app and saw it was set for treadmill running (thanks to my
13 mile death run on a treadmill on Christmas Eve *shudder*), so it wasn’t
tracking me via GPS. I had run for 11:17
at that point, so I decided to just call it a mile and start the app
properly. (I later used my computer to
determine it was 1.17 miles.)
Undeterred, I got to the top of the Beast and began my descent. To run 8 miles, I thought I’d run to the
turnoff to my subdivision then figure out how much more I needed to run to get
to 8, then do half that and run back. This
turned out to be more complicated by the fact that I needed to add the missing
mile to my distance, then do my calculations.
But doing math in my head makes my run go quicker, so it’s all
good. I determined I needed to run 2.75
miles beyond my subdivision and then turn back for an even 8. That meant I had to turn around when MapMyRun
said 4.25 (which would actually be 5.25, since I was missing a mile). My muscles and joints felt okay, but my skin,
nose, and ears did not. It was friggin’
cold! Usually when I run in the
mountains it is closer to midday. Today, the late afternoon sun was sinking far
enough into the western horizon that the forest was throwing long shadows
resulting in very little sunshine. And
the wind was whipping me in cold gusts. I
reached my turnaround point and realized my skin was tingling in a bad
way. And my ears were freezing, so much that
my ear canals felt like little ice caves stabbing into my brain.
(When these
beautiful caves bore into your skull they are painful.)
I’ve been
cold on runs before. The Tough Mudder
was this past February and I’m pretty sure I finished it in the early stages of
hypothermia. I did the race with my
friends, KO Kennedy, Peppy, and Obstacle Racer.
Phoenix in February is usually pleasant.
But it is less pleasant when you begin the 12.5 mile dirt course with an
obstacle called “Arctic Enema.” It
consists of a giant container lined with plastic, and filled with ice
water. To keep it icy, they continuously
dump ice into the container all day. The
layer of ice cubes at the top is a couple inches thick. There is board in the middle of the container
that goes a foot or two under the ice water.
You jump into the ice water, then swim under the board, pop up on the
other side and attempt to haul your frozen, shivering butt over the opposite edge
of the container. Arctic Enema is among
the most horrifying sensations I’ve ever experienced. As I emerged from under the board, I heard
this weird gasping/grunting sound and then realized it was involuntarily coming
from my mouth! To top it off, the wind
was unusually robust that day and we were drenched from the Arctic Enema to the
end of the race. Every time we started
to dry off, the Tough Mudder course obligingly dumped us into another water
obstacle, though thankfully just regular water as opposed to ice water. When they handed me my finisher’s beer at
the end of the race hours later, my hand was shaking so badly my beer sloshed
out onto the ground. Party foul.
(Why did I
do this? Oh yeah, bragging rights.)
So I suppose
it was appropriate I was wearing my Tough Mudder shirt today. I was cold in a different way, but every bit
as uncomfortable as I was in February.
Whereas in February my entire body just felt extremely chilled, today my
exposed skin and extremities were stinging cold. My core was warm; in fact, I was sweating
through my shirt (to keep myself warm, I tried running faster, but that just
resulted in more core-sweat and did not help my extremities). But beyond my core, I was icy cold. My leg muscles never felt warm, causing some
mildly alarming tightness in my hamstrings.
So I caved. At 6ish miles, I gave up and called Husband
#1 to pick me up. I managed to make it
about .6 more before he found me (then gained another .15 when I mapped the
un-tracked part of my run). I climbed
into the car, grateful for heat. The car
thermometer said 37 degrees. What the
WHAT? Where was my mid-40s
temperature? I checked my weather
app: it said the temp was 36 degrees, 28
with wind chill factored. And I was the
dummy running in a thin t-shirt and tights.
28 degrees is a far cry from mid-40s!
Astonishingly, when I stripped off my running clothes, my shirt was
soaked through with sweat, even though my skin was bright red and still
tingly. The shower burned that red skin,
but I didn’t care. The heat felt
divine. Tomorrow I will run again, adequately
prepared with long sleeves and a hat.
(Really, it
seems dangerously inaccurate for this app to simultaneously tell me that the
current temp is 28 degrees and that I should expect it to be 46 degrees until
6:00 tonight.)
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