I was in my car driving through the park to the place where I wanted to start my run (yes I mostly drive to the park – living in the city, I prefer to run surrounded by greenery rather than exhaust pipes when I can), when I saw something strange – someone (an attractive blond lady) running in the rain, carrying an umbrella.

My initial thought was that this was just someone who was late for something, but what was strange was that on closer inspection, the lady was dressed in all the running gear and running “properly” if you know what I mean. She was obviously someone who ran frequently.

I suppose it’s not unusual for people in training to carry light weights while running for a bit of an upper body workout, but I would have thought that in this case if that was the purpose then maybe 2 umbrellas would be better (or alternate the 1 umbrella from hand to hand).

No, I guess she just didn’t like the rain! Maybe she doesn’t have a waterproof with a hood.

While I’m on the subject of carrying things while running, maybe someone with knowledge of physiology can help me out here.

When I see someone running with a pack on their back it worries me! My initial reaction is “that can’t be good for the spine”. Now I know that sometimes people run from place to place (say from work to home) and need to carry their clothes, but some seem to just want to carry more weight for an extra workout.

As I said – it worries me – and my gut feel is that it has a high potential for damage – more than just getting wet!