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The latest running fashion…with a bite
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Have you ever had the shit scared out of you on a lonely, late-night run?
The run into hell
You’ve come home after a long day at work and you’re debating on whether or not to go out for a late-night run. Not wanting to fall behind in your training, you lace up your Asics and head out the door.
While the streets are mostly vacant, the area is pretty well lit so you start to relax a bit and enjoy the music on your iPod and the steady cadence of your footfalls on the pavement. At the halfway point, you decide to take a turn down a residential side street to cut the run a bit short since it’s getting late.
A white piece-of-crap sedan passes you from behind. You notice there are three or four young men looking at you as the car goes by. They slow down and pull to the curb on your side of the street about 500 meters ahead.
“No biggie,” you think to yourself. “They’re probably just visiting someone in the neighborhood.”
You slow your pace and keep an eye on the car.
Nobody is getting out.
Your palms get a bit sweaty and your stomach does a flip-flop as your inner voice starts to express it’s concerns.
As you run closer to the car, your rational mind tries to drown out your instinct. “You’re being paranoid. Nobody’s going to do anything in such a well lit area. These things don’t happen to me.”
You slow down some more to give them time to exit the car. Nobody moves.
About 50 meters from the car, your instinct is screaming so loudly that it finally drowns out your inner liberal pansy who believes that everyone should love one another and those who don’t are just misunderstood. Not wanting to test your civilized mind’s theory that these young men may simply want a hug and an earnest conversation about saving the gay whales, you decided it’s time to turn around.
But, it’s too late.
At this point, your threat radar has moved from Condition Yellow to Condition Orange*
You execute a swift 180 and pick up your pace again.
Behind you, you hear the car start and your heart rate jacks up another 20 beats when you realize the car is approaching you. You look over your shoulder and see it is slowly pulling up along side.
You start running through options. “I could get on my cell phone and call for help, but it’d be too late by the time someone showed up. Hell, I run here all the time but I can’t remember the street’s name!”
And of course, the rational mind classic: “I can’t believe this is happening to me.”
The car pulls alongside and the driver’s window rolls down.
“Hey lady,” the young man says with a smile. “We’re trying to find Martin Dr. Know where it is?”
“I’m sorry. No.” The rational mind dictates you be polite even though your instinct is redlining it for you to haul ass down the street.
“We have a map. Can you look at it? You probably know the area pretty well, right?”
The car accelerates a bit to get ahead of you and stops. All four doors open and all four men exit the car.
Your life just took a turn toward Shitsville and a brutal reminder that in spite of Oprah saying to the contrary, you are still part of the food chain.
Fight or flight?
Oftentimes, the best defense is the Nike Defense: Turn on your heels and run like hell. “Feets, don’t fail me now!”
Sometimes, you don’t have that option. Most likely, this is because you missed the warning signs and/or failed to listen to your instinct. Or, were tuned in to your iPod instead of your environment. Oops.
Last month, I was on a neighborhood run with my two daughters (ages 10 &7) when a white beater sedan pulled the same maneuver with us. Once I noticed that they were parked in an odd spot and were in no hurry to get out of their car, I turned around and backtracked.
Would anything have happened to us?
I doubt it. However, I can take that chance when it’s just me. I will not take it with my daughters.
For those times when you’ve missed all of the cues and you’ve found yourself in a pickle, it’s nice to have a bit of a deterrent on hand. Normally, when I run at night, I carry my BGBG stick
Women, who are the favorite prey of male predators, need something a bit more persuasive…and pretty.
Fashion with a bite
Introducing the C2, where fashion meets fucking someone up. The folks at Taser International unveiled this little beauty during the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas last week. It’s a standard Taser (up close zapping plus the ability to shoot the darts and give someone 30 seconds of high voltage affection) and MP3 player.
How cool is that?
The C2 comes in seven designer colors: Fashion Pink, Leopard, Red Hot, Black Pearl, Electric Blue, Titanium, and Metallic Pink.
It looks like you have to purchase the zapper and MP3 player separately. The 1 GB player is built into a carrying case so you don’t accidentally fry your brains when you’re plugging in your earphones.
Now you can rock out to your tunes and have the ability to put out someone’s lights at the same time.
If you want to see the C2 in action, check out the video in the L.A. Times.
Find your edge and dance upon it.
hak
*The Color Code of Awareness. I’ll write more about this Wednesday.
**Bad Guy Be Good
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woah; thanks for the reminder. it’s definitely easy to forget…
I had seen this out there — not a bad mix of practical and predictable.
And, btw, “where fashion meets fucking someone up” … easily the funniest description I’ve heard in a long time!!
I concur. when fashion meets fucking someone up. Heh heh…I read about this in Newsweek.
Yeah…I’m not the best source for what’s new out there, am I? I’m typically about a week to a month behind in life. ;)
Have you read any of Gavin DeBecker’s books - _The Gift of Fear_ or _Protecting the Gift_?? The first is about tuning in to our intuition, and the second is about utilizing this “gift” with your kids (the antidote to all of those “stranger danger” talks). He uses a lot of real world examples and both are great reads.
As for the taser/MP3 player, isn’t that kind of contradictory? The best way to not have to use a taser is to not be running deaf to your surroundings. I carry a runner’s version of pepper spray on my bikes and runs, and it’s useful for dogs or people (though I’ve only had to spray dogs in 20+ years of training). My main goal is to just be able to get away and of course use my cell phone. Usually, keeping your senses on alert to your surroundings (as you describe here with the white car) is your best defense. I do think an MP3 player can undermine that ability.
Robin,
I have not read any of those books. Will have to add them to my reading list.
I agree that coupling an MP3 player with a Taser does nothing to improve your awareness. However, it’s designed to be the last zone of defense, not the first…which is awareness.
We had a discussion going on at Slowtwitch about this with some members chiming in with their stories. Very interesting read. Most, if not all, thought something was “funny” about the situation they were getting into, but for whatever reason, ignored that inner warning voice and rode/ran into an attack.
Hak’s First Rule: Pay attention to your environment to avoid getting in a pickle.
Hak’s Second Rule: Always have something that you can use to fight your way out of pickle (brain, hands, feet, weapon, etc.) for that moment when you’re in touch with your inner dumbass and oblivious to the rest of the world. It happens.