Earlier This year, Death Valley earned the
distinction of having the highest temperature ever recorded on earth. Back on
July 10, 1913, it got up to 134 degrees. The top spot was held by some dusty
corner of Libya, but the 136 degrees once recorded there was tossed out on a
technicality, moving DV up to the top spot – We’re #1!
From the looks of the readings being posted thus far
in 2013, that 100-year-old Death Valley record might fall just in time for the
Badwater 135 Ultramarathon.
Yeah, because the 125 degrees I once ran in while
visiting there wasn’t hot enough.
Don’t get me wrong – I love hot weather. And perhaps
more strongly, I hate the cold, a relative term, since what is “cold” to me is
comfortable, even warm to others.
My running friends know this, and no longer bat an
eye when I show up in long running pants, a pair of shirts (one long-sleeved),
mittens and a winter hat when it is in the mid-50s.
That's me - NOT training for Badwater, on a sunny 65-degree day in Ohio.
All this talk of loving the heat and birthright
running across the desert, though, doesn’t measure up to much compared to the
realities of the extreme temperatures of Death Valley. As described in the 1999
documentary “Running On The Sun” by my good friend Chris Moon, whom my wife
Star and I crewed at Badwater 2012, the heat is “fierce.”
He said to get a feel for it, grab a hair dryer,
point it at your face, and turn it on full blast. That gets the point across –
to your face – but I believe the true effects require 1,000 hair dryers, turned
on high and pointed at your entire body for 10 hours.
I am not exaggerating the heat – and I am not hiding
the fact that I am scared of it.
I have crewed two different times, and visited Death
Valley on other occasions, including the 125-degree day Star and I went there
“for fun.” Not only is the heat unrelenting, it seems alive and rudely acts
like it could care less about me, you, or anything else it envelops. I mean it
– it feels like an angry death force.
Doing the Badwater 135 sounds like a great way to
celebrate 50 years of living, then, huh?
I think so, too, but not without adequate
preparation.
That is why you may have seen me out on a sunny,
warm day running on our local bike path or in my neighborhood wearing a black,
long-sleeved windbreaker, maybe even running pants, mittens and a winter hat.
And it is now why I have been camping out for an
increasing amount of time in a friend’s sauna, where my sessions start at room
temperature of maybe 75 degrees, climb to a recorded 200, then drop back to a
steady 170 for longer and longer periods.
I plan to complete about 30 sauna sessions before
the race. And this doesn’t include time in our “junior sauna” – the upstairs
bathroom in our home warms up nicely in the summer, and has a built-in wall
heater, so I can get it to 100 degrees or so while the rest of the house is
cool. 
The basket of guest towels comes with a thermometer. It was 91 up there today without the heater.
During my time in the heat, whether the sauna, my
cozy bathroom or even out running in layers or warm days in Florida, I am
drinking increasing amounts of water and sports drink. The point of all this heat
training is to teach my body to process as much fluid as possible to stave off
dehydration. Running in high temperatures and dry winds means I will be pumping
out gallons of sweat as I proceed across the desert, and I need to be able to
replace this liquid – untrained, the body can’t absorb it quickly enough.
How much “life” I absorb from this whole experience
remains to be seen …
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