I love my iPod Shuffle. When I go for a long run I like to plug myself in and listen to all my favorite songs delivered up in random fashion. Sometimes, I even find myself adjusting my pace to fit the tempo of each track.
But I don't use the iPod when running on roads in traffic. Even though I always run on the side of the road facing the oncoming traffic, I figure that I want to be able to hear what's going on around me. If some rogue car or motorbike, perhaps overtaking another vehicle, is approaching me from behind on the wrong side of the road and not seeing me, I want to be able to hear it before I am flattened under its wheels. So I only use the iPod in traffic-free areas such as sidewalks, trails in the woods, or one of my favorite running locations, the East Bay Bike Path.
I don't often run on the beach. When I do I tend not to use the iPod because I like to hear the sea. Don't all sailors? But I can imagine that if I were planning a long run on a flat, boring beach I might plug myself in to the device. I mean, there's no danger of being taken by surprise by some vehicle running into me from behind on a beach, is there?
Wrong!
Check out this strange story about a runner who was killed while running on a beach listening to his iPod after being struck from behind by... a single-engined plane making an emergency landing.
It's a strange, dangerous world out there kiddies. Play safe!
1 comment:
Luckily he probably never knew what hit him
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