This weekend, Southern Ontario has been dealing with another heatwave; on some days, the humidex has been over 40C (104F). To compound this, smoke from the north started to work its way to the south on Sunday night; yesterday’s Air Quality Index was at a 10. In fact, Toronto had the second worst air quality in the world.

Yesterday was also the day that I planned to do my long run. However, the heat and the smoke warning were enough to keep this asthmatic runner indoors for the day. In the early evening, the air was better so I was able to get outside for a quick 9k run.

This morning, I finally headed out for my long run. My plan was to run 30K close to home. This would let me go home to get water, Nuun and other electrolytes every few kilometres as well as make it easy to end my run early if it got too hot. When I left the house, though, I realized that it was also garbage day in our ward, which meant some stinky areas and having to run with the odd garbage truck or two. So I quickly changed my route and headed towards areas where I knew it was not a garbage day.

The second part of my plan was to take it easy, really easy, with the pace. My friend, Kelly-Lynne, has often told me that I could run for hours and not feel tired if I slowed the pace down enough. Recently, another friend shared pace adjustments for the heat with me, and I remembered that I needed to run 30-40 seconds slower per kilometre on days like today. So I happily ran along at today’s happy pace, one that would let me cover the distance that I wanted and keep my body healthy.

My new plan was to pass a Rec Centre approximately every 5 kilometres so that I had access to water and bathrooms. After 90 minutes, I was drinking water as well as dumping it on my head and down my back to help stay cool. I adjusted my route (again) to streets that had more shade and splash pads. When I got to the splash pad only 4 kilometres from home, I was the only one there! So I took off my shirt (I am shy about that), held it under water until it was soaked and wore it for the last part of my run. This was definitely the highlight of my run.

Almost 3 hours later, I was done. My legs felt good, my breathing was fine and my clothes were absolutely drenched. I spent the rest of the day replenishing fluids, eating a lot of fresh fruit and bringing out my creative side.

I only met one of my goals – keep the pace easy – as I stopped at 29km. At that point, the humidex was at 34C (93F) and I had had enough. Between last night and this morning’s run, though, I covered 38km, just under the marathon distance, and I am very happy about that. Also, I had absolutely no GI issues during either run, even with the heat. Things are definitely improving in that department and my confidence as a long distance runner is starting to come back.