What is irony?
Have you ever noticed that your designated rest days are ironically the most beautiful weather days of the year? (For example, I’m usually resting on Mondays, like today, but looking outside, I’m thinking I should have chosen a different day–it is beautiful, sunny, and cooler fall weather.) Does this mean you should change your running schedule and rotate your rest days? It is certainly possible to do that but when I do rotate, it becomes less likely that I will rest at all. Running is too ingrained.
Other ironies: Your running headlamp batteries will run out on the darkest morning/night, with fog/rain to boot. Your desire to run will be the most intense on the days you feel most fatigued/injured. Your desire for peace and quiet during a particular run will be most disturbed by chatty runners with headlamps that won’t stay out of earshot (this just happened to be over the weekend so I turned the run into a fast fartlek workout and lost the chatty chatters). Your music-loaded ipod or phone will die during a run when you really need it to either track the distance or to help distract you from running aches & pains. When running, you will see the large obstacles that could cause you to slip and fall but you will miss noticing the smallest ones (which pose the greatest threat to you) until you hit them (e.g., small rocks when you are wearing Five Fingers). While running around Lake Michigan, a seagull will choose you (of all people) to land on your head because your hair somehow looks like a nest.
Even more ironies: The night before your longest runs & toughest workouts, you will be unable to sleep. The night after your longest runs/toughest workouts, you will have no problem sleeping.
On the days that you wish to run fast, the running path/trail will be so congested/crowded with runners, bikers, pedestrians, strollers, babyjoggers, walkers, and skaters (oh and don’t forget pets), you will be unable to navigate easily without really stepping up your speed way beyond your goal. Or you will be forced to adjust, either re-routing your run or abandoning ship for the day, cutting the run short.
On the days you have chosen to run long, it will rain cats and dogs or snow or sleet. Then there’s the irony of not wanting to run on the treadmill that day but being forced to by these weather conditions.
On the hottest, most humid days of the year, you will end up wearing too many layers of clothes and on the coldest days of the year, you will end up wearing too few layers of clothing. In Nebraska, the only certainty with the weather is that it will change immediately, without a moment’s notice, when you least expect it.
Another funny irony is accidentally overloading my Nathan water bottles for running, causing them to drip or drizzle all over me before I can drink them. Or if I mix Nuun hydration in them, the carbonation will bubble over and splash me all over my legs and/or face when I try to slake my thirst.
Do you look for irony when you run? What running ironies have you noticed?
Go enjoy some nice cool fall runs this week!
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