Running, part 2: Mother Nature's Vengeance

After my eight-mile adventure, I took a few days off from running. I was surprisingly not sore, though, so when the IEc running group scheduled a training run for Thursday at noon, I immediately agreed to join. Unbeknownst to us, though, Mother Nature was coming for us with a vengeance.

Our regular group of six included four crazy people who run outside even in Boston winters, two of whom are marathoners. Nevertheless, these runs were fairly comfortable, both in terms of pace and weather. We would run three to five miles in 45 minutes or an hour, but - because it's impossible to avoid when running in a city - we'd stop every mile or so to wait at a crosswalk. We'd stop at the public water fountain after a Fresh Pond loop. We did get caught in a light spring rainstorm one day, but generally the weather was in the 60s to 80s and partly sunny.

But Memorial Day weekend was unseasonably cold. It frosted overnight, killing brand new spring seedlings, and the afternoons were only in the 50s. It rained. It was sweatshirt-and-slippers weather. While people across the country were barbecuing, I made soup for dinner.

If Memorial Day weekend marked the return of winter, then Thursday must have been Opposite Day. All of a sudden, it was 96 degrees without a cloud in the sky. I sweated profusely walking ten minutes to work, and people quickly switched from heaters to air conditioners. I don't remember a single day all of last summer in Boston that got close to 96. This was like a summer day in St. Louis, not a spring day in Boston.

Of course, we had scheduled a five-mile training run for Thursday at noon. We are not quitters, so all six of us went. It was brutal. We - even the marathoners - ran less than three miles before stopping to walk. We splashed our faces at the Fresh Pond water fountain and strategized to find the shadiest streets to run/walk back to work. We wished for a shuttle bus to  pick us up. It was disheartening not to be able to run three miles without stopping, but we reminded ourselves that the race would be in the evening, so even if it were 96 degrees that day, the route would be cooler and shadier.

When we made it back to work after that run, everyone was tremendously impressed with our dedication. And I felt so proud: what do I normally do on a work day? Type-type-type at my computer. What had I done that day? Run five miles at noon in 96-degree heat. Oh yeah.