Come over to the Dark Side

Yes, that time of year is upon us again. The time of year that no mat­ter whether you run early in the morn­ing, or later in the evening, chances are that if you run out­side, you will be run­ning in the dark. And with fam­ily life as it is, there are sel­dom times to run other than early in the morn­ing or later in the evening, so for me this time of year means that prac­ti­cally every run is in the dark.

For many, this means the end of run­ning out­side and the start of “tread­mill sea­son,” but it doesn’t have to be that way. By tak­ing just a few safety pre­cau­tions, you can con­tinue run­ning your favorite out­side routes — even in the dark!

Stick to what you know

It’s impor­tant when run­ning in the dark to stick to famil­iar ter­ri­tory. Try to run on routes that you know well. Explor­ing new ter­rain is a good way to get injured. Small pot­holes, uneven side­walks, cracks in the pave­ment, and sticks and stones in your path can cause you to twist an ankle or take a spill. Don’t risk injury by run­ning on unfa­mil­iar ground.

Stay nim­ble on your feet

Even if you run famil­iar routes, you’re bound to step on some­thing unex­pected. The other day I was out run­ning in the dark. It had been rain­ing for the pre­vi­ous few days, but the roads had dried off. I had been run­ning on dry pave­ment and had for­got­ten about the soggy ground. I cut a cor­ner, ended up step­ping in a huge mud pud­dle. For­tu­nately, I was run­ning with a light stride and was able to quickly jump back up onto the pave­ment. When run­ning in the dark, try to keep your weight on the balls of your feet, and be ready to react to unex­pected footfalls.

Don’t sweat the pace

When you’re pay­ing extra atten­tion to the ground in front of you, you shouldn’t be push­ing the pace. It’s eas­ier to run respon­sively and react to sur­prises when your pace is a lit­tle slower. It’s more impor­tant for you to fin­ish your run with­out injury than it is to keep the same pace you keep in day­light. Stay safe on the darker stretches of road and save your speed for the well-​​lit areas.

Use your periph­eral vision

The human eye works dif­fer­ently at night than it does dur­ing the day. You may have noticed when you walk into the dark that at first every­thing seems really dark, but after a few min­utes you can see bet­ter than you did ini­tially. This is because your night vision has set in. When run­ning in the dark, give your­self a few min­utes before start­ing to allow your eyes to adjust.

One your eyes have adjusted, you need to use them cor­rectly to max­i­mize your night vision. In day­light, we are accus­tomed to look­ing directly at some­thing for the clear­est focus. In the dark, how­ever, this is the worst thing to do. The part of the retina that is used when you look directly at some­thing is opti­mized for day­light vision, but is in effect a blind spot for night vision. The areas just around your cen­ter of focus are the most sen­si­tive to light and con­trast and offer the best night vision. The tech­nique to use to opti­mize your night vision is to look at the hori­zon and keep scan­ning your eyes from side to side so you don’t focus on one spe­cific spot. While doing that, pay atten­tion to what you can see just below your cen­ter of focus. In this way, you will be able to bet­ter see the path in front of you than if you look at it directly.

You may see them, but they can’t see you

Run­ners are very dif­fi­cult for dri­vers to see. Your eyes have adjusted to the dark, but a driver’s eyes have not. A dri­ver is look­ing into the area in front of them that is illu­mi­nated by their head­lights. This light pre­vents dri­vers from devel­op­ing night vision, so every­thing on the side of the road — includ­ing you — is extra dark and dif­fi­cult to see. Your best bet for safety is to wear some­thing reflec­tive. Here are a few options.

Reflec­tive Vest

A reflec­tive run­ning vest is the most ver­sa­tile, because you can wear it in warm and cold weather. Just make sure you size it so that it fits over your cold weather run­ning gear.

Reflec­tive accessories

If a vest isn’t quite your style, then con­sider using reflec­tive acces­sories to make your­self more vis­i­ble to dri­vers.

Reflec­tive jacket

Of course, if you’re run­ning in the cold, a reflec­tive jacket is the way to go. Check out these options.

So don’t let the dark keep you indoors! Stay safe, and wel­come to the dark side!

6 Comments

• 
  Giedt October 12, 2010 at 1:22 pm

  I am a huge fan of the Fire­fly blinky light from Roa​dID​.com. That sucker is pretty darn bright, is small and clips almost any­where. I got blue, but there are many col­ors to choose from.

  Reflec­tors only work when a dri­ver turns on their lights. There are too many knuckle-​​headed dri­vers at dawn/​dusk tran­si­tion that don’t turn on their lights, or just turn on the run­ning lights. That is why I use both pas­sive (reflec­tor vest) and active (Fire­fly) devices.
  • 
    Evhen October 12, 2010 at 1:31 pm

    Thanks for the sug­ges­tion! Here’s the link to RoadID’s Fire­fly prod­ucts page for any­one who want to check them out. http://​www​.roa​did​.com/​C​o​m​m​o​n​/​C​a​t​a​l​o​g​.​a​s​p​x​?​C​=​F​i​r​e​fly
• 
  Fitz October 12, 2010 at 1:10 pm

  Another use­ful tip for all that bright yel­low gear: wear it in a race so your friends/​family can iden­tify you! I wore a neon yel­low sin­glet when I ran the NY Marathon in 2008 and my fam­ily said it was so much eas­ier to see me in the crowds as I ran by.

  Cheers,
  – Fitz.
  • 
    Evhen October 12, 2010 at 1:28 pm

    Another great idea. Thanks for sharing!
• 
  David H. October 12, 2010 at 9:09 am

  Good tips here. I carry a very small, but very pow­er­ful flash­light that gets people’s atten­tion fairly quickly.
  • 
    Evhen October 12, 2010 at 10:27 am

    Great idea! I haven’t tried that yet, but may have to on my next run. Thanks for the suggestion.