My birthday present from hubby:-)

Running with a camelbak

2 Nov 2009

This evening I went for my first run after Sunday's 21.1k in Constantia. Don't get me wrong, of course I have plenty of excuses for letting 7 days lapse between runs. First I needed to recover after the half-marathon. In particular I strained a hip flexor muscle which was fine when warmed up and walking around, but there was quite a bit of discomfort (mild pain) when getting up in the morning and I though the injury should heal properly before running again. Then I was in Jhb for work on Wednesday and came down with a head cold on Thursday. So I decided to take it easy. Swam 4 laps in the 50m public pool on Saturday and then went for a short hike with the dog in the evening (we hiked up and then ran down in Cecilia Forest). That little run, probably about 3km, was great to get the blood flowing. Made me realise how much I miss trail running and that I need to practice on the trails more often. Then on Sunday (yesterday) I hiked Constantia Corner, a fairly strenuous 3 hour hike (including breaks) with quite a bit of steep uphill. Very beautiful and lovely to get off the beaten track. When we got back onto the jeep track for the descent we realised how many people were out on the mountain.


So anyway, I went out for a short run this evening, again with the trusty dog. The main purpose of the run was to test out my birthday present, a blue classic camelback pictured above. I had previously run trails with a hip pouch that takes a 500ml bottle, but it didn't always feel comfortable and secure around my hips. And to be honest, even though I said it didn't, it actually did jiggle quite a bit when running. And getting the bottle in and out to take a drink broke my stride. I used this system on the Greyton 11k trail run a few weeks ago and also found that 500ml of energade on a hot day wasn't quite enough.


Well, enter the camelbak classic. I have Deuter hydration system which I use for hiking, so I'm quite familiar with the principle, but let me tell you, it's a dream to run with the camelbak. It fits snugly on my back and rather high up as well, so getting too sweaty wasn't much of a problem. It doesn't have a chest or waist strap, but was so comfy on tonight's run that at some points I forgot that I was wearing it. And it's blue, my favourite colour, which happens to perfectly match my favourite blue first ascent running shirt (hey, I'm a girl, allowed to be a bit superficial;-). Also, while my Deuter system sometimes leaks all over me (annoying when you have a sugary energy drink in the bladder) the camelbak doesn't leak at all (this is why it costs more than the generic systems I suppose). It takes 1.5L but I only filled it up with just under a litre, and didn't feel the weight at all. Thought I'd build up to carrying more weight, though 1L will probably be enough for most of the kind of trail running I'm planning to do (nothing more than 12-15km).


Road runs usually have water points every 3km, so I'll be using the camelbak for trail running mostly (a reason to get out there more often), for shorter hikes when I might want to run a bit; but most importantly for long training runs. The last long training run of 15k I did, I got rather thirsty and dehydrated and had to detour via a petrol station or two to look for public access taps. Not impossible, but a bit less convenient than just being able to take a sip from my camelbak.


Now I just have to get over my guilt that I enjoyed a few cooling sips on tonight's 7k run, while the poor dog, panting away, had to wait until we got home!