Running is an all-weather sport

I logged 18 miles yesterday in single digit temperatures, and during the 2.5+ hours that I was running, I had plenty of time to contemplate my sanity. Not sure that I came to any definite conclusions, but I knew that I was happy to be running despite the icicles forming from my eyelashes.

Actually, it really wasn't that bad - I was slightly overdressed and working up quite a sweat (an odd sensation when the temps are that cold). For my upper body, I wore a long sleeve tech-T, a long sleeve 1/4 zip heavy tech-T, and my new running jacket with fleece vest liner. For the legs I wore tights with running pants on top, regular running socks with thin dress socks over them (mainly to ensure I had something over my ankles), light gloves inside a pair of my hunting mittens, and a face mask. I put Aquaphor on the exposed portion of skin around my eyes.

Normally, if I overheat, I would just shed a layer, but due to the extreme temps, I was afraid of shedding a layer and then exposing sweat dampened clothing and figured that wouldn't be very good. Fortunately, I was able to get used to the extra clothing and monitored the situation by lowering/raising the zipper on my jacket - it's amazing how much heat can be released or retained by doing this. I was also afraid to pee behind a bush as I normally would from a real fear of a mid-stream freeze possibly leading to even more troubles.

Aside from the shear weight of all the extra clothing, the mask also made for very labored breathing. It has holes in the mouth and nose area, but still obstructed the air from flowing freely. My water bottle froze too (guess I should have been able to predict that), but luckily my route looped back by my car a little past midway where I had another bottle that was still in liquid form.

I didn't really want to be out in the cold yesterday, but not running would have made me very grumpy, and I didn't think I could last that long on a treadmill. As I told Mendy, "I just wouldn't feel right if I didn't get my run in." Oh well, I guess there are worse hang-ups to have.