Can I at least wear a speedo?

So, I get this facebook post the other day asking be me be a partner streaker next year. I knew what the person meant, but it sure made a funny sounding post if you're not a runner. A streaker is someone who runs the whole year to see how long of a running streak they can accomplish. At least 1 mile every day is the goal.

I wasn't sure about it. Running outside in the winter is a lot different than running in any of the other seasons. The biggest reason I am hesitant is that I had ran four and a half miles last week and my knee started hurting a few hours after my run. Being a real busy week at work, it was easy for me to skip the rest of the week. I did notice that I had mistakenly put on some old running shoes. Speaking of that, I think both pair are now wore out.

Not wanting to make matters worse I even read up on knee soreness a little bit. Come to find out the top reasons are bad shoes and weak thigh muscles. You see, it is the thigh muscles on the top of your leg that hold your knee cap in place when you are walking or running. What happens is that your back thigh muscles get strong and you start running farther, faster, and harder which is when sore knees usually likes to surface. So we need to exercise our top thigh muscles more.

Let me just say running in snow is a lot harder. I had to concentrate on my form this weekend to make sure I didn't roll my foot in or out and kept it flat. When running in snow on the road it is easy to think of your feet like paddles and that maybe you'd get better traction if you ran on the edge of you foot and pushed off the snow. Unfortunately, that leads to injury. So today I kept my mind on my form, landing and running flat footed. It makes it difficult to "push" forward with snow between you and the road so your pace ends up slowing down a little. However, my knees are fine so far. If I experience some delayed onset muscle pain then I know I am pushing myself too hard and will need to run shorter or even slower.

So the last two days I have ran two runs, each 3.3 miles of which 3 miles was running and the rest was walking. It took me a little over 40 minutes each time.

SAFTEY -> So, running in the winter on the road has me freaked out a little. It is not so easy to leap in the ditch or for a car to avoid me. I have had a couple of close calls in the past. Even though I am withing a few miles of our house most of the time, I doubt any neighbors a mile down the road in any direction even know who I am. So I purchased a Road ID.

Photo of my Road ID

You have two choices. Put basic information on the ID or you can pay a monthly fee and then they put a phone number and a subscriber ID on it. So I put my Name, Year of birth, City and State of residence, home phone, wife cell phone, No Known Allergies, and 13 point freaking 1 (the distance of the longest even I have participated in).  If I would have thought a little bit, I would have added my blood type "BT A+".  All of this information could be useful to paramedics if needed. I know it is difficult to think about, but they are about $20 and it could help save your life. Now... if I can just remember to wear it...

So how has winter running been for you? What do you think about being a streaker in 2014?