Hot! Hot! Hot!

North Carolina, where I live, is having a heat wave: highs this week have topped 100 a couple of times, with more promised. I walk in the mornings before work, and yesterday when I stepped outside at 5:45am, it was 80 degrees. I mean, that was the low temperature for the day. Plus it had rained a few hours before, so it was downright steamy out. One of those days when you feel a wall of stickiness when you walk outside.

Now I don't know about you, but I sweat. I don't glisten, or perspire in some sort of elegant, ladylike way. I sweat. By the time I got back from my 3 mile walk, I was soaked from head to toe. So what do I learn from days like this?

1. Walking early is the best solution. I'm lucky, because I'm a morning person. But even if I wasn't, there's no way I'd be walking at the end of the day when it's 90+ degrees out.

2. Tech fabrics are great. They don't keep you from sweating, but they do help the sweat evaporate more quickly, thus keeping you cooler.

3. You hear this a lot on hot day, but hydration is important. As much as I sweat, I can lose a lot of fluids on days like yesterday.

Another Race

After lots of pondering, I've decided to take the plunge and register for another half-marathon. This will be my 4th half altogether. It's the City of Oaks Half-Marathon in Raleigh, NC, and takes place in early November.

The main reason I've hesitated to do another race is because I've been trying harder to lose weight. In my experience, it's tough to train and concentrate on weight loss. For me, one of the biggest issues is my eating after the long training walks on weekends. I'm absolutely ravenous for the rest of the day after most of them, and I find that I can easily justify eating anything in sight: "Gee, I just walked 10 miles, so I can eat those 5 brownies." Obviously, the math doesn't add up, and calories consumed aren't outweighed by the calories burned. So I have to really watch myself on the weekends, even more than usual.

I decided to go ahead with the race, though, mainly because the discipline that training requires is a good thing for me. It provides structure to my workouts, and provides a goal I can work toward. So I'm going to give it the old college try, and hope for the best. We'll see how it goes.