Run 598
Average pace: 5:43/km
Location: Burnaby Lake (CCW)
Start: 12:11 pm
Distance: 5:02 km
Time: 28:42
Weather: Cloudy
Temp: 18ºC
Humidity: 45%
Wind: nil to light
BPM: 172
Weight: 163.4 pounds
Total distance to date: 4570 km
Devices: Apple Watch, iPhone 8
Taking on faith the accuracy of the weather forecast (I know, I know) I headed out today in shorts and t-shirt. It was already 17ºC, which was the forecast high for the day, so I suspected being cold would not be an issue. It ended up climbing a degree for the run.
It was cloudy and a 0% chance of rain was promised in the early afternoon, so I donned my non-water resistant AirPods and headed out.
When I got to the lake it started to sprinkle. Fortunately it never amounted to more than that, so I stayed fairly dry, despite the intermittent raindrops.
I had to whizz when I got there and another person went into the Jiffy John™ just as I arrived. This set the tone for the run, the day, everything. She was in there for a weirdly long time, while her friend/neighbor/relative shuffled around awkwardly nearby. I finally went and started off counter-clockwise. Because I began on the south side of the dam, I actually hit the 5K mark before getting to the marker, which was a nice change.
The trail was busier than I expected, given the cloudy skies and sprinkles. People were variably dressed in anything from shorts and t-shirts to winter jackets. I found the humidity made it feel quite warm, especially with the utter lack of wind.
There was a cyclist near the end and when we made eye contact, he nodded in a friendly way at me, so obviously my face was not doing what I would have expected it to be doing.
And it seemed like everyone was walking in a way to form a wall across the trail. A couple of times I nearly had to go right off the trail to get around, even after making my presence known. I’m not sure why today was like this.
I started out well, so well that I made myself slow down, then I basically collapsed in the second km, eventually recovering to where the fifth km was actually the fastest. I was five seconds slower than the last run, which is just enough to sting a smidge, but worse, my BPM was way up, to 172. So I worked harder to get worse results.
On the plus side, I was concerned about the knees going in, but they were fine, and I didn’t experience any other issues, either. Post-run, I did a lot of the run/walk thing and that all went well. In fact, it seemed like I had more energy after the run.
Overall, then, a mixed bag. Maybe (haha) I’ll try running during the week again. We are now looking at the sun setting before 7 p.m., though, which means that I would be finishing my runs only about 20-25 minutes before.
