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Yesterdays weather in Clermont FL : 91 degrees, and 73% humidity.

The average temperature for Kona October 11th is 86 degrees, and 50-80% humidity. Of course in Kona I will be starting my run around 1pm.

I’ve got my head down, running up the first hill on the dirt trail through the orange groves. I’m busy adjusting my hat to reduce the glare, and look up to see that I am 5 feet away from stepping on a Gator! Let me repeat that:

5 feet away from stepping on a Gator!

I blurted out a lot of words which my mother has never heard me say, and ran by. We weren’t even terribly near water, but there was a second, smaller (2.5′ to the 4′ of the first one) gator on the road at the hill crest. FUN. In the hour following my 90 min run, I drank 6 liters of water before getting my body back to it’s starting weight. Even 20 minutes after the run, in the air conditioned sanctuary of the Then I went and swam 3 more km bringing the daily total to 7.5.

My plan of ‘training in the height of the head did back-fire a little once. It’s pretty common for 2-5pm to have lots of rainstorms. After biking 30km to the pool to sit there for 4h in vain waiting for the ‘lightning danger’ to go away so that it would open for a swim, before riding home in the rain.

The funny part is that the rain storms are so localized that it’s like stepping into the shower.  When I approached my first rain-storm, I stopped 20 meters away from the edge of it, and pondered my next step.  A motorcyclist drove into it, so I followed.  The rain was falling so hard that it hurt, road kill turtles were floating by in puddles, and visibility was so poor that I am riding faster than the cars.

Then I rode out of it… turned the corner… and flash-blam lightning is landing beside me in the field, rain is pounding down again…   could this by why helmets come with visors?

*Nathaniel is back in Chelsea walking dogs at the time of this writing