Year Zero

So I made my first ‘hot weather’ run of the season, here in Panama City. And i’m still alive.

Although i understand it was just a mild 31 degrees, I can safely say, it was certainly the hardest 3km of my life (im running 3km and i have a 250km race next month, dammit!).

Note forced smile for the camera -I could hardly stand up

Can you imagine sitting in a very large sauna, just beginning to sweat as some Finn put lots of water on to show off. With running gear and an 8kg backpack on. Then running 3km? Well, sounds easy, if you’re sitting in your bed reading this, or tucking into fish and chips somewhere. Well, maybe i packed my pack too heavy, it jostled about as it had my laptop etc in there (ill bring a towel this time as i’m soaking with sweat here in the air conditioned heaven of Dunkin Donuts)  or maybe it was because i just came from Baltic winter weather last night, or maybe it was just the sheer humidity taking it out of me,  but to be honest I barely made the 3km today. (19 mins by the way in case youre asking,  6 and a bit mins a km)

 From the map there seemed to be three decent choices – a trail in the national park that borders the city, the promenade along the waterfront (its about 3 km long) and the causeway  beside the Panama canal which is about the same. It was a hot day and i had my pack on so i opted for the easiest to find, at the seafront. I walked about and got myself familiar with the city too (ok ok it was noon and i was scared to run in such heat)

Either way it really brought it home to me how difficult and different running several marathons in severe heat  will be compared to running on a nice easy indoor running track back home. How i laugh now at how i nievely thought that running 10km circuits every few days would prepare me for such hell. Fortunately most runners are North European and don’t know what the hell they are up against, so maybe this month of hell in the tropics will give me an advantage when it comes to the race. Either way im going to try 4km tomorrow, i think ill try the causeway then, its about 2km there, 2km back, and ill pack my bag with the same things as ill take in the MDS itself – sensible huh?

 I think tomorrows run will be better as im more aclimatised to the heat (i feel a total dickwad whinging about sruggling over such a short distance already, but i may as well be honest about it)