Bellwether
http://www.theweathernetwork.com/weather/cities/can/pages/CABC0308.htm
If you're a marathoner for any length of time on the West Coast, and of any sense, I hasten to add, you learn to hone your weather-eye. I am still staggered by the numbers of runners who will show up for a long Sunday run that is going to last for hours and they are utterly unprepared for the conditions that they will face. This goes beyond carelessness and neglect, in the case of real weather extremes, to bordering on the stupid. Me, I'm a wimp. Maybe it's the fact that I'm a Leo. God knows, most cats hate the water. The very thought of me running in the rain for a few hours and I immediately think of things like gloves, hats and a rain-shell - either a jacket or a vest.
Why this now? Because it looks like I have an 80% chance this Sunday of running for four hours and forty-five minutes in "light rain". This is good news. Yesterday, they were predicting a hundred per cent chance of precipitation for Sunday. And the temperature prediction has gone up several degrees. So my chances of dying from hypothermia mere days after surviving my near death viral experience, is a little ray of sunshine...
But trying to get some runners to equip themselves with a cheap hat and a pair of 99 cent gloves that they have the option of tossing away is sometimes like pulling eye-teeth. But I guess a die-off of stupid runners is one way to improve the gene pool... Of course, should these runners survive the rain, wet and cold to make it to summer, they will be the same ones who try to do twenty mile runs in 75 degree heat without a water bottle...
Why do I care? Well, I have to care. Try as I might, I just can't help myself. Honestly, what kind of Pace Group Leader or Pace Bunny would you be if you didn't want to see the people you run with get the most out of the experience with the greatest degree of enjoyment possible. And as always, I can say that, weather-wise, I have been there and done that. I have been on the borderline of hypothermia in extremely treacherous mountain conditions where my life depended on me doing the smart and not the stupid thing and I have done 70K ultramarathon trail races in the middle of August in temperatures that soared to the upper 80s.
The paradox of course is that endurance runners are highly individualistic, driven, independent, and often with highly-developed little egos and senses of self and yet when running with a group or in a race we are all merely part of a larger collective. Endurance runners hate to be told what to do. They (I) all think they (I) know best. But of course the ends of marathons races and the adjoining medical tents are littered with runners who knew it all. It's an interesting race strategy to not drink enough water, not take enough gels, to go out too fast, to run a race when you haven't trained properly, and to not prepare for the weather conditions on race day. And I love the runners, who, when injured, ignore the pain and run through it. Wow! Man, that is fucking GENIUS at work!
The thing about running in a group is that you have to submerge your ego, or at least keep it in check, long enough to consider the possibilities that your actions may have an impact on everyone else. In a marathon race, what is the cost of stupidity? Despite all the volunteers in a race, medical tents are not free. They are part of the cost of the event. As a Pace Group Leader over the years I have had to arrange for taxis and ambulances to deal with runners who have become injured. Interestingly, a closer examination of the injuries, accidents and incidents reveals that nearly ALL of them occurred at the ends of long runs and involved runners who weren't properly conditioned, hydrated, fueled, or who were running over their heads with a group of runners that were too fast for them to keep up with over a long haul. My experience is that you can't tell these people what to do, and they certainly won't listen to you. But in the end, when something happens to them, you have to take care of them. You have to. It's the right thing to do. But it is a fascinating window into human behavior and ego...
Why the Sermon? Because all of the above is preventable. And the absolute BEST part? Cool temperatures with a light rain on marathon day translate into fast times. Just be prepared. Even Formula One race cars, whose drivers have arguably the largest testicles on the face of the planet, come equipped with rain tires. And the Formula One teams with the best pit crews and the best rain strategy win the races when it rains...
SO BRING YOUR FUCKING RAIN TIRES!
VROOOOOMMM!!!! VROOOOOOOOMMM!!!
If you're a marathoner for any length of time on the West Coast, and of any sense, I hasten to add, you learn to hone your weather-eye. I am still staggered by the numbers of runners who will show up for a long Sunday run that is going to last for hours and they are utterly unprepared for the conditions that they will face. This goes beyond carelessness and neglect, in the case of real weather extremes, to bordering on the stupid. Me, I'm a wimp. Maybe it's the fact that I'm a Leo. God knows, most cats hate the water. The very thought of me running in the rain for a few hours and I immediately think of things like gloves, hats and a rain-shell - either a jacket or a vest.
Why this now? Because it looks like I have an 80% chance this Sunday of running for four hours and forty-five minutes in "light rain". This is good news. Yesterday, they were predicting a hundred per cent chance of precipitation for Sunday. And the temperature prediction has gone up several degrees. So my chances of dying from hypothermia mere days after surviving my near death viral experience, is a little ray of sunshine...
But trying to get some runners to equip themselves with a cheap hat and a pair of 99 cent gloves that they have the option of tossing away is sometimes like pulling eye-teeth. But I guess a die-off of stupid runners is one way to improve the gene pool... Of course, should these runners survive the rain, wet and cold to make it to summer, they will be the same ones who try to do twenty mile runs in 75 degree heat without a water bottle...
Why do I care? Well, I have to care. Try as I might, I just can't help myself. Honestly, what kind of Pace Group Leader or Pace Bunny would you be if you didn't want to see the people you run with get the most out of the experience with the greatest degree of enjoyment possible. And as always, I can say that, weather-wise, I have been there and done that. I have been on the borderline of hypothermia in extremely treacherous mountain conditions where my life depended on me doing the smart and not the stupid thing and I have done 70K ultramarathon trail races in the middle of August in temperatures that soared to the upper 80s.
The paradox of course is that endurance runners are highly individualistic, driven, independent, and often with highly-developed little egos and senses of self and yet when running with a group or in a race we are all merely part of a larger collective. Endurance runners hate to be told what to do. They (I) all think they (I) know best. But of course the ends of marathons races and the adjoining medical tents are littered with runners who knew it all. It's an interesting race strategy to not drink enough water, not take enough gels, to go out too fast, to run a race when you haven't trained properly, and to not prepare for the weather conditions on race day. And I love the runners, who, when injured, ignore the pain and run through it. Wow! Man, that is fucking GENIUS at work!
The thing about running in a group is that you have to submerge your ego, or at least keep it in check, long enough to consider the possibilities that your actions may have an impact on everyone else. In a marathon race, what is the cost of stupidity? Despite all the volunteers in a race, medical tents are not free. They are part of the cost of the event. As a Pace Group Leader over the years I have had to arrange for taxis and ambulances to deal with runners who have become injured. Interestingly, a closer examination of the injuries, accidents and incidents reveals that nearly ALL of them occurred at the ends of long runs and involved runners who weren't properly conditioned, hydrated, fueled, or who were running over their heads with a group of runners that were too fast for them to keep up with over a long haul. My experience is that you can't tell these people what to do, and they certainly won't listen to you. But in the end, when something happens to them, you have to take care of them. You have to. It's the right thing to do. But it is a fascinating window into human behavior and ego...
Why the Sermon? Because all of the above is preventable. And the absolute BEST part? Cool temperatures with a light rain on marathon day translate into fast times. Just be prepared. Even Formula One race cars, whose drivers have arguably the largest testicles on the face of the planet, come equipped with rain tires. And the Formula One teams with the best pit crews and the best rain strategy win the races when it rains...
SO BRING YOUR FUCKING RAIN TIRES!
VROOOOOMMM!!!! VROOOOOOOOMMM!!!
posted by Vince Hemingson at 11:55 AM
1 Comments:
Crap! Lets hope it is a light rain and not the "chance" of showers like last Saturday...
Hopefully it will change before Sunday. I was really hoping for a repeat of the last 2 years....
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