It’s hot out there: give yourself a break
Running in hot weather is hard work, so why are we hard on ourselves?
We all know it’s harder to run in the heat. And yet, I still see so many runners giving themselves a hard time for not being some sort of superhuman anomaly who isn’t affected by the warmer weather.
You might catch yourself naming your Strava run something self-deprecating. Or feeling a bit deflated after a slower-than-usual parkrun. Even though we know we’re likely to run slower in the heat or humidity, it’s hard not to feel like we’ve failed a little when we glance at our watch, see a slower pace, or clock up more walk breaks than usual.
If you’ve been running for more than a year, you’ve probably seen this pattern before — summer comes, running gets harder, then autumn arrives and everything magically feels better again. Your pace picks up, your energy returns, and you remember that you weren’t “losing fitness” after all — you were just really warm.
How heat affects our bodies
So what’s actually going on? When the temperature rises, your body has to work harder to cool itself down. More blood is directed to your skin to help release heat, which means less is available to deliver oxygen to your working muscles.