Running in the Heat

This is not, I'll admit, a common Vancouver problem, but as I laboured through a run yesterday morning I was immediately regretting that latte I had thrown back just a few moments before. My hotel was nicely located in an outdoor shopping mall, and I wanted to take advantage of the location by logging some laps around a verdant outdoor space filled with inviting foot bridges, waterfalls, and enough visual distraction from the many storefronts. I left the lobby, conservatively slow--I used to live in the region and know how hot it can get--but even at a reasonably casual pace, the heat was scorching. Despite doing a lap, about 3.5k in total, around the outdoor shopping complex, I felt more spent and drained than I had after a cool 8k at the Modo Spring Run-Off two weeks earlier. Sure, I've been a little behind the ball with the running and training as work and travel kick in to high gear, but it was that unrelenting Florida sun that was taunting me. I scrambled to find shade as much as I could, but it was all for not. In 32-degree weather, shade is only a quick and all too short respite from an intense heat that really knocks your energy down fast.

Once I got back to the hotel, I took stock of the run--and my wheezing fit to catch my breath. Water. I had not had nearly enough of it. Why didn't I see anyone else running? They had considered what I failed to: that the Florida sunshine can be unforgiving and it is best to pull out the cardio in the early evening or mornings, before the sun has reached its full effect.

Excited as I am that Spring-like (emphasis on the 'like') weather has (mostly) come to Vancouver and I can lace up my ASICS and head out on leisurely jog around the seawall, my run yesterday was a reminder that this far South, the words 'polar vortex' have no meaning--and when the weather is this intense, you can't hydrate enough. In the meantime, I'll keep to the air conditioned hotel gym for the next few days of my Florida tour.