These past two days have been challenging for runners in Flagstaff, what with the wind howling and gusting and knocking over trash cans and lithe runners with equal impunity.
I always thought I was the only one who hated the wind, loathed it with a passion. Not justhead winds, either, but a tail wind that blows you forward isn’t optimal for keeping form. Me? I prefer a calm sky, not a squall. But in Flagstaff, that’s not feasible for part of the year. Saturday’s 20-mph wind with gusts in the 60-mph range was a doozy; I worried that a ponderosa pine or two would fall on me on Lake Mary Road.
When I returned home, wind-blown and chapped lipped, I went on social media, as one does, and saw that I’m not the only one cursing the cruel winds.
Pro runner Kim Conley, a two-time Olympian who calls Flagstaff home, posted a photo of herself on Strava (see above) on her treadmill with the following message: “26 treadmill miles in the last 25hrs bc I’m being a baby about the wind.”
Many of us can no doubt relate, Kim.
Plotting my Sunday long run — the forecast called for more gusty conditions — I came up with what I thought was a workable solution. Knowing that about 90 percent of the time, the winds in Flagstaff blow from west to east, I decided to drive 13 miles from my home and park the car north-west along Highway 180’s roadside (ignoring the signs not to park for snow play) and run home. This would mean at least 10 miles, maybe 11, with the wind at back back before I hit downtown Flag and turned west toward home.
So, what happened? The wind laughed at my plans and decided to swirl, at times seeming to come from multiple directions. The closer I got to Flagstaff, though, the more the wind behaved itself and blew from the west. That last two miles going west back to my home? I coped, but it took quite an effort to keep the same steady-state pace.
This might be an option ( of course, I had to drive back with my best buddy to retrieve the car I left on 180) for runners, like me, without the grit to power through blustery headwinds.
Or you could just do what Conley did.
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