What to wear while running

As I mentioned the other day, I haven't gone running frequently in the past month because the Babe keeps getting up early. I feel quite cheated, because I have to get up early but I don't even get to go running. I'm finally getting back into it, and I have a new challenge -- I have to decide what to wear while I go running.

In the summer it's a no-brainer -- a t-shirt and shorts every day. But now that the weather is getting colder, I have to decide whether I want to wear a long-sleeve t-shirt or gloves or a hat/earband, or long pants, etc. . . . these just aren't decisions that are easy to make at 6 am. Fortunately, I have a bit of experience when it comes to guessing how cold it is and what I should wear. Even though I've been a mostly slothful and sedentary slug for the past several years, I used to run regularly in all sorts of weather. So I can usually decide what combination of clothes to wear based on the temperature, precipitation, and wind. (Another important factor is what clothes are clean at the moment, but that's not exactly a weather factor.)

If I wear too many layers I am pretty comfortable at first, but I'm sweating buckets by the end. That's no fun. I don't like having my lungs burn from the cold while I'm perspiring profusely under my sweatshirt. On the other extreme, if I don't layer up enough, I never warm up during my run, which can make my joints stiff and my muscles tight, and I'm more likely to be sore later in the day. One thing that I like to do is to avoid very thick clothes, but have gloves and a earband. Since you lose most of the heat from your body through your head, the earband helps keep my core temperature up. And since your extremities are the parts of your body that get cold first, the gloves help keep my hands warm. (My feet are usually fine, since most of my blood is going to my legs already.) If I under-estimate the temperature, it isn't too hard to take off and carry a small pair of gloves or an earband. I can't say the same about a baggy sweatshirt, however.

The sweet spot of running in the winter is to have few enough layers that you're cold when you first start running, but by the half-way point you've warmed up and you're comfortable for the rest of the morning. I hit that sweet spot pretty well this morning with a long-sleeve t-shirt, shorts, and a pair of knit gloves.

As you can probably tell, I put far more thought into this process than any normal person would, but that's what runners do. They're kind of crazy people, running around in little shorts in sub-zero temperatures. And I may be slow, but at least I still know how to dress like a runner.