You Know Nothing…

John Snow. That is how I must have looked while I was out for my run last night after work. With so many layers on, it may as well have been fur pelts from how it felt under the weight of it all. With the miserable cold and the gusts of wind, it certainly felt like I was north of The Wall. Overdressed is what I really was, but that was fine compared to being under-dressed with a sharp, cold breeze blowing off Lake Michigan. Whitecaps raced toward shore, but I was determined to keep a very, VERY, slow and steady pace. For the Shuffle, I jumped after ‘the gun’ to a faster start than I probably should have. I didn’t feel tired, but my pace steadily decreased with each mile of the race.

After a day of recovery on Monday, Tuesday I set out to try to achieve a slow and steady pace for the duration of my run. While not perfect, I did indeed see results. Sadly I still started off quickly, as now it seems to be a reflex that I need to break, but this was corrected after only a few hundred yards. To achieve this progress, I needed to make sure that I not only ran slow enough, but also consistent enough. I have never run with music before, but I figured that this might be a good time to try out some headphones a friend got for me, specifically with running in mind. As a way of maintaining some semblance of consistency, I choose a band that played with steady rhythm and maintained cohesion throughout the album (short album though it is) with mood and tempo to help balance my own state of mind as well as the rhythm of my feet. For this run, I chose Bearstronaut’s album Satisfied Violence, partially because it met the criteria, partly because it has been stuck in my head for about a week and a half anyway, so it might as well be stuck in my ears. The songs have an upbeat pace so I cut my footwork to follow at half tempo at parts and took tiny steps at full tempo for others. This had an unforeseen bonus of being lighter impact on my shins as I ran, which I thoroughly enjoyed and will remember for future recovery runs. Unfortunately for those around me, I also decided to sing along as I ran down Lake Shore Trail. Fortunately for Humanity, it was cold enough out that I was basically alone on the trail. Sadly it seems we will probably not actually see a ‘true’ Spring this year given all of the cold lingering on well into April; but we can all take comfort in knowing that…summer is coming.