The Calm before the Storm

I'm going to try using a little lighter shoe this time. The Saucony Fastwitch 3 is 8¾ ounces for my size 12½, about 2 ounces lighter than the Saucony Tangents I used for Houston '09 and '08, and a whopping 4 ounces less than the Nike Zoom Elites I've been using.

The weather seems to be following the forecasts. Some early morning fog is now expected; that's the biggest today. I'm going to wear my sunglasses, so I might have some trouble seeing early in the race. Today's NWS discussion highlights the fog:

A SURFACE LOW PRESSURE SYSTEM WAS LOCATED OVER THE NORTHWESTERN GULF. THIS FEATURE WILL CONTINUE TO MOVE EAST NORTHEAST AND AWAY FROM THE REGION. AN UPPER LEVEL STORM SYSTEM CONTINUES TO SPIN OVER TEXAS AND THIS FEATURE IS ALSO PROGGED TO SHIFT EAST LATER TODAY. WITH THE UPPER LOW NEAR BY THIS MORNING...WILL KEEP A CHANCE OF RAIN IN THE FORECAST. AREAL COVERAGE AND INTENSITY SHOULD BE ON THE WANE AS MOISTURE LEVELS SLOWLY DROP AND LIFT WITH THE UPPER LOW DECREASES. CLOUDS WILL PROBABLY HANG AROUND MOST OF THE DAY AND THIS WILL KEEP TEMPS ON THE COOL SIDE. SKIES WILL CLEAR THIS EVENING AND WITH WET GROUND...FEEL AREAS OF FOG COULD DEVELOP BY SUNDAY MORNING. THE FOG WILL BE SHALLOW AND BURN OFF QUICKLY ON SUNDAY. WEAK HIGH PRESSURE WILL SETTLE OVER TEXAS ON SUNDAY AND MONDAY BRINGING CLEAR TO PARTLY CLOUDY SKIES AND WARMER TEMPERATURES. SUNDAY WILL BE ONE OF THE NICEST DAYS THIS AREA HAS HAD SINCE MID-DECEMBER.


Here's the NWS hourly projection for Marathon Sunday. The NWS still projects 40°F at the start and 51°F at 10AM, with the dewpoint in the upper 30s to 40. No change from yesterday; still very nice for running. They now have a WNW wind at 2 mph to a WNW wind at 5 mph and predict more clouds with sky cover at 67% to 46%.


The 84-hour model now includes marathon morning. This model follows along with the NWS hourly projection [the graph is in UTC, six hours ahead of Houston]. The text version of the short range models are available now. They show temperatures a little warmer and winds from the northwest.




The Weather Channel now has hourly details for Marathon Sunday. There's very little change from yesterday's forecast:

7 am
Clear, 43°F feels like 41°F, 0% chance of rain, winds from W at 4 mph
sunrise Sunrise 7:17 am
8 am
Sunny, 44°F feels like 42°F, 0% chance of rain, winds from WNW at 4 mph
9 am
Sunny, 47°F feels like 45°F, 0% chance of rain, winds from WNW at 4 mph
10 am
Sunny, 51°F feels like 49°F, 0% chance of rain, winds from WNW at 5 mph
11 am
Sunny, 54°F feels like 53°F, 0% chance of rain, winds from WNW at 5 mph

AccuWeather now has hourly details for marathon morning. They predict a little warmer conditions:

Sunday, Jan 17
7AM
43°F, RealFeel® 44°F, Dewpoint 39°F
Winds WNW at 2 mph
Partly sunny
8AM
44°F, RealFeel® 47°F, Dewpoint 39°F
Winds WNW at 2 mph
Partly sunny
9AM
49°F, RealFeel® 54°F, Dewpoint 42°F
Winds WNW at 2 mph
Partly sunny
10AM
54°F, RealFeel® 61°F, Dewpoint 44°F
Winds WNW at 3 mph
Partly sunny
11AM
57°F, RealFeel® 64°F, Dewpoint 42°F
Winds W at 5 mph
Partly sunny

I couldn't resist taking a picture of this Watermill Express poster with all of the Tornado runners.