sunday runday

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An Intro to Running with Dogs

Another Sunday Runday, and for the last couple weeks one of my small run crew cohort has joined us on the trails with her faithful canine running partner. A two-year old collie, her human leader (one of my long-time running friends) has spent a lot of effort training the dog on harness and leash to run at a steady pace beside her.

Which reminded me…

A puppy runs towards the camera on a snowy sidewalk.

A couple months before I kicked off this blog we welcomed a new addition to our household. The pictured pup is a little more than five months old, a Miniature Australian Shepherd, and full of spit and fire.

I’m hoping she’ll be a runner some day.

I’m hoping that this spring we’ll find out.

It was specifically one of the questions I asked the breeder: How will she run?

Oh, she’ll keep up with you. She’s not short on energy.

All that said, we’ve done some quick sprints on our walks to give her a taste of moving faster than a stroll, but five months is too young to properly begin distance training with a dog.

Most online research I’ve done on this topic suggests a puppy should be at least six months old to begin a proper training program, and (not coincidentally) her veterinarian just happens to be one of my running crew so I’ll be getting proper professional clearance before we begin.

Still, running alongside a well-trained running dog this morning got me itching for the spring thaw… just in time to start thinking about how to introduce my favourite energetic pup to my favourite outdoor sport.

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Urban Creek Run Club

Sunday Runday, and the weather improved by about thirty degrees Celsius over last weekend. I’m not afraid of the cold, but since I couldn’t run with friends I’m not running alone in brutally freezing temps.

This weekend we resumed our small band of cohort runners for the second real run club of the year, and located some urban trails closer to the downtown of the city where we could enjoy the zero degree weather.

The run included some scenic views of the downtown. (I used to work in one of those buildings! I guess I still do, I just haven’t been there in almost a year.)

We navigated our way through some of the asphalt paths, still crunchy with a layer of dirty snow, up and into one of the neighbourhoods, and then back into the creek valley via a staircase. My calves were not impressed. I guess I should go up and down my stairs at home a little more frequently than to just refill my coffee.

During the fall this is a lovely canopy of colours rich with that scent of gently decaying foliage. Today it was a well-trod winter path, wide enough to socially distance.

None of us were feeling particularly fast, but it’s been a long, cold off-season. Most of these folks should have been running marathons this year, but thanks to the pandemic it’s more likely to be virtual 10k races.

And yes, those are shorts… anything warmer than zero is shorts-weather around here.

And the creek, still frozen, beckoned us for a short stretch of our total distance. The water underfoot is frozen for about thirty or forty centimeters of ice thickness. If it happened to crack though, no worries: the creek itself is only about a meter deep.

Cold yes, but not too deep.

We concluded with some lawnchairs in the parking lot, drinking some coffees from a nearby local and independent cafe, bundled up in our blankets and trying to keep at least six feet apart while we recovered.

Hopefully the running season keeps at this pace, even though my personal pace could use a lot of improvement.

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Spreadsheets & Footfalls

Sunday Runday, and I’ve been hiding in my basement from the brutal cold, focussing on cross-training which is never a replacement for actually getting out on the trails.

Not in quality of workout nor in the enjoyment of the effort.

Runners on a trail with thick green foliage.

I’ve also been reflecting on the last year of pandemic lockdown and realizing that I’ve let a few things slip. I used to be particularly diligent in how I recorded and tracked my fitness. Used to be, being the operative words.

Last year, for example, I completely neglected using the tracking tools I’d built for myself over the last decade. Before using Strava as a tracking crutch, I was meticulous in how I tracked and recorded my runs. I had built and refined a simple but useful goal-based spreadsheet for time and distance that calculated a few other factors in keeping myself on track. How much did I run. How did it compare. How much did I need to focus to catch up or get on track with an annual distance goal… that sort of thing.

I also made it available to others for a few years in a row on my previous website:

Make Your Own Copy of the 2021 Run Tracking Log

So, since I’ve started using it again and I’ve put in the effort of updating it for 2021, please make a copy and use it. It’s mostly simple, but I’ve always preached that in running (or life in general) information and data are powerful allies.

Spreadsheets can be for more than business and budgets.

They help track goals and progress.

They highlight gaps and changes in routine.

They offer insight into trends in your training.

And they provide an ongoing overview of what can be accomplished by day after day after day of hard work which is motivational and can often give that extra nudge towards improvement.

I’m neither fast nor competitive, but that also means I don’t have the benefit of a coach or endless access to resources that could improve my training. I’m just a guy who likes to get out on the trails, but that doesn’t mean it’s none of it is worth tracking. It’s worth it to me, and a spreadsheet is a simple and low-cost way to track it all.

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How should you dress to run in winter?

The saying goes, there’s no such thing as bad weather, only bad wardrobe choices.

Yet, as I prepare to post these words on this Sunday Runday it is -34 degrees Celsius on the other side of my front door and this morning I’m leaning on the fallacy of that statement: that’s actually pretty bad weather.

I do run in the cold, frequently.

When I run in the cold a few simple rules apply.

Layer. Head to toes, it’s generally seems more effective when I have multiple varied layers of clothing than fewer. Layering not only traps warm air in the spaces between the layers, which is what keeps you insulated and warm, but it provides opportunity to select different fabrics for different jobs: insulation, wicking, wind breaking. It also allows you to shed a layer as you warm up.

Tuck. As valuable as lots of layers are, I find they are even more valuable as things are tucked into other things. Sock cuffs pulled over long underwear legs. Shirt hems slipped between skin and the underwear band. Neck buff squeezed under the shirt collar. Half way into your winter run is no time to figure out that there is a freezing breeze sneaking through a gap in your clothing defence.

Head. I often apply the layering and tucking rules to the head and neck as well, but I call it out here because getting the right gear on your noggin is a specifically important point worth mentioning. Ears get frostbite very easily. The neck line and face are tough to work around with the need to breath and all that. And you can make a snug-fit inner hat by turning a buff inside out, twisting it a three-quarter turn at the 60/40 split point, then inverting the longer side over the shorter.

Traction. Often overlooked in cold weather running is proper footwear. Ice is everywhere when the weather turns cold, and deep snow can slip into the air vents of shoes quickly freezing toes and packing into the tips of toes leading to injury on long runs. Specialized shoes are a great investment if you’re a dedicated winter runner. Or, if you’re only sticking to cleared pathways a pair of pull-over traction grips like Yaktrax will last you multiple seasons and store conveniently with your winter gear or in the backseat of a vehicle.

Support. Having a support line is too often taken for granted in cold weather running. If your winter wardrobe doesn’t include easy access to a running partner, or a phone if you’re going out solo, don’t go. Someone always knows where I am on my winter runs. Things can go bad so much more quickly in the cold, and after a few kilometers of sweaty exercise, a damp runner who slips on the ice or twists their ankle in a snowbank can be in huge trouble.