Night Runs

No, not to the bathroom.

Sicko.

I'm in that weird part of my training for a fall race...where the sun is setting WAAAAY earlier than the heat is leaving.  And school's started back, so running in the morning just isn't happening.

I'm going on runs at night and in the dark.  Yikes!

Here's the story... last night I had an 8 mile tempo run (actually, 10 with warm-up and cool-down) on the agenda, but it was muggy as all get-out. I checked the weather, thinking I could leave at 6pm for my run.  Nope, 88 degrees.  Too hot.  But at 7pm it was down to 81.  Perfect!

Except there was a chance of rain at 8pm.

I ignored common sense and headed out the door at 7pm.  It actually was quite lovely outside and didn't start raining until 6 miles into my run.  Of course, it got dark about 5 miles in, but I had a headlamp and a back flasher thing.

Am I stupid?  I feel safe doing this, but most people freak out when I talk about my night runs.  I figure my biggest safety hazard is tripping & that's where the head lamp comes in.  That, the flasher, and all my reflective junk makes me pretty visible.  Plus, I don't run on roads and my trail only crosses roads at street-lighted cross walks, so cars aren't an issue.

David wasn't really happy about the situation, so we've decided that he'll get to come along (on my bike) while I do my next night run.  That should be cute, right?  Although I'm not so sure it'll be safer, since he's likely to run me over with my bike :)