iPod Playlists for Running

In A Trail Runner's Blog: The Best iPod Playlist for Running an Ultra Marathon, Scott Dunlap lists six strategies for creating an iPod playlist for ultra marathons. They range from including songs that govern pace to avoiding echoplex during the final miles. I already have playlists for various distance runs. I'll now have to create one for the 50K Chubb Trail Run which I plan to run this coming spring.

I've written before about how I'd like to have Bluetooth capability on my iPod so I could record thoughts and lines for poems while running. Scott's entry has made me think about poems I could put on my iPod, poems I could listen to for mental stamina when the road or trail gets tough. One poem I'd add is "Run," by Keli Stafford, which appeared in the 9.2 (Winter 2005) issue of The 2River View. I'd add "Birth Dues," by Robinson Jeffers, only for the first line: "Joy is a trick in the air." If I knew I'd be running trails, I'd add "The Road Not Taken," by Frost, for the line "Two roads diverged in a wood, and I-- / I took the one less travelled by, / And that has made all the difference." That's three poems, and as I'm a slow runner, maybe they'd last for half a mile. I guess for an ultra marathon I'd need hundreds!

I'll work on a playlist of songs, instead.