Except I have a problem, one that I've been aware of for awhile, but has come into sharper focus in the past few days as Mother Nature dumped a pile of snow on our dear city and turned down the thermostat: I don't know how to work out in the winter. This sounds dumb. It is sort of dumb. And it's not really all exercises, because the strength and flexibility workouts I like the most are Pilates and yoga, and both of those can easily be done in the home.
It's cardio. I was so pumped about getting back into running this summer and fall, and now I'm afraid it's just going to slip to the wayside. I've ran in the snow before, in training for track and junk in high school, but I just really hate the way it makes me feel: my cheeks and lips get chapped like a little kid who went sledding all day, I get cramps from tensing up and trying not to slip and fall on my ass, and, most of all, my lungs feel like they are turning inside out. Plus there's the fact that you need to buy expensive fancy gear for cold weather running, which makes me cringe because I don't have money to blow on this, but also because one of the reasons I love running so much is that all you need are a pair of shoes and a pair of legs.
So, to avoid the outdoors, I could go to the gym, but besides the fact that gyms bore me to tears, I just can't seem to get into the same rhythm on the treadmill that I do on the pavement. And ellipticals are alright, but I don't feel like they give me the same intense, pure cardio workout that I crave. Plus, of the two gyms that are available to me, one is up the steepest effing hill known to mankind (Who decided to build the Pete on the top of the biggest hill in Oakland? Who? I want to know, so I can sue them when my uncoordinated little body slips and topples all the way into oncoming traffic on 5th Avenue) and the other is in a cramped little room with no TVs or views of the city through the windows, just the shiny sweaty moving flesh of other people to stare at. I could probably dedicate an entire post to my gripes about gyms. Perhaps I will sometime. But right now that would not help me.
I think what I want is a perfect solution, and I'm not going to get it. The running I love is outdoors, through neighborhoods and parks and woods, and not on a track or a treadmill or any other made-for-running apparatus. I know I'm going to have to compromise, but I guess what I'd like to figure out is how to reduce my losses. Like finding cheap, quality spandex/Under Armour stuff, or the streets in Shadyside that are the best plowed/salted.
So, sorry for this post that is essentially one big complaint, but it's just a problem I've encountered every year for awhile now: not just how to keep working out in the winter, but how to love it.
I completely sympathize, I face the same issue in the winter of 07-08 in Pittsburgh. I sucked it up the hill most of the time and ran on the treadmills at the Pete while listening to downloaded This American Life and Wait, Wait Don't Tell Me on my mp3 player. Or I waited for halfway decent days and ran down Ellsworth through Shadyside. It's a crappy time of year for Pittsburgh running, but spring isn't too far off don't get discouraged! :)
ReplyDeletePsh. This isn't whining. It's a big fucking problem. Last winter my running outside went by the wayside when I was running in a cemetery near my apartment (a terrific place to run because it's as big as a park, and closer than any of the other parks in the area). My rule for running in cemeteries is this: run on the grass unless you'll find yourself running over someone's grave. Hah. While trying to be "respectful" to the dead I slipped on a patch of ice and ripped up the only pair of underarmour I own. I still wear the underarmour because it's too expensive to replace, but the holes in it keep getting bigger every time I put them on.
ReplyDeleteFor the snow, now I just stick to running in place on a trampoline in my apartment. It annoys the people beneath us because its squeaking sounds like sex noises, but they blast music constantly while we're trying to study, so it's a fair trade-off. :) Trampoline running sucks, but it's better than nothing, cheaper than a gym, and better on the knees than a treadmill.
I've never thought about running in place on a trampoline. I wish I had one.
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