Murphy’s Lore

Sam warmly embraces the cold weather. The cold weather returns the favour

The trees are bare, their branches etched black against a pale grey sky. My breath appears in little puffs as I run, my feet crunching softly on frost-dusted grass. It feels a lifetime ago when I could get my running attire on in two minutes flat. Shorts, vest, shoes – go. Now it’s long sleeves, long tights, base layers, hats, gloves and waterproofs, the donning of which leaves plenty of time for second thoughts.

I run past an overgrown pond and remember how in the summer, Morris, my terrier, refused to pass it without getting in up to his shoulders to cool off and lap up some of its murky-looking water. Now it’s coated in a dull layer of ice. It’d be easy to feel dispirited about such a state of affairs – how many months until spring? – but instead it serves to remind me of the impermanence of everything in nature, the relentless cycle of change. I say ‘in nature’, but impermanence affects every aspect of our lives – health, relationships, running plans. No matter how good or bad today is, tomorrow will be different. The day after that, different again.

I see it as a reason to find the joys of running in every season, rather than hurrying time along. To revel as much in the stillness that rests upon the landscape in winter as in the new buds and birdsong that announce spring.

A survey of more than 6,000 runners (The National Runner Survey, 2017) found that winter was the least popular season for running – only 10 per cent preferred running at that time of year. (Autumn was the most favoured season, followed by spring.) I get it – winter running can be testing. Pavements slick with black ice; once-firm trails turned to puddle-pocked mud; dark mornings and still-darker evenings; air so cold that it stings the back of your nose and makes your eyes water. But once I’ve got over overdressing, ending up with so many layers tied round my waist that I look like a mobile cloakroom, I can derive a lot of pleasure from my winter runs. Having the deserted beach to myself, spotting the streak of a ginger fox loping across a frosty field, the thrill of running after dark over snow that illuminates everything as brightly as if it were daytime.

I also have a suspicion that winter running makes us stronger. I’ve been holding beginners’ courses at my running group for the last four years – one in January and one in June – and I’ve noticed there are many more of the winter starters still running with us now than there are of the summer contingent. Perhaps turning out for your first- ever run on a bone-chilling January morning builds fortitude and resilience to help you stay the course.

Legendary runner Emil Zátopek once said: ‘There is a great advantage in training under unfavourable conditions. It is better to train under bad conditions, for the difference is then a tremendous relief in a race.’ That’s undoubtedly true, but even without a race firmly in your sights, conquering the trials of running on icy pavements or six inches of snow through northerly winds and subzero temperatures has its rewards.

Cold as I am when I step out for this morning’s run, I finish toasty, stripping down to my T-shirt for my cool-down and stretch before heading home. Passers-by wrapped up to the gills shiver as they clock my bare arms and I think how empowering it is to have created this heat through physical effort – my own version of a Ready Brek glow that will bolster me for the rest of the day and remind me that I’m strong and capable.

There will, I know, be a lot of car windscreens to scrape and socks to dry on the radiator before this winter is through, but, just as the endless days of last summer now feel like a distant memory, it too shall pass. It’s the way of things. Relish it now, and you’ll soon be piling those bobble hats into a box marked ‘ winter gear’ and opening the door to spring.