Jogging: Where o where

Heart pounding, knees aching, sweat dripping, body hurting – these are the typical effects of running at a slow pace or commonly known as jogging. Jogging is a tremendous physical activity which helps us stay young and healthy. It helps build stamina and endurance. It also helps with weight loss or weight maintenance. It is also costs free. You don’t need any fancy machines to jog. All you need is a shirt, running shorts or jogging pants, rubber shoes, a lot of motivation and you’re all set to go. Since we need to exercise at least one hour a day, this could be the most regular activity we could do since we can do it anytime.

I for one, jog at regular intervals. I jogged once a week at Burnham Park when I was still in Baguio and now that I moved here in UP Diliman, I jog twice a week regularly. I could remember my 1^st jog here in UP around the Academic Oval. It was the evening after the Math 17 1^st long exam. My friend and I decided to jog after the mind drenching exam to relieve and relax ourselves. We did some stretching and some warm ups first. We then started from Roces Street and jogged at a slow pace until we reached the Oblation. We fastened the pace until we finished one round. We were perspiring like you’ve never seen before. We wanted to stop but we decided to do one more round for fun. At the end, we had a little race to see who finished first and unluckily, I lost.

Jogging in UP was quite different from jogging in Burnham Park in three aspects. In terms of temperature and atmosphere, they are completely different. In Burnham, it is quite cold and humid making it hard to breathe. Sometimes, I stop just to get my breath once in a while. But one advantage of jogging in this type of environment is that you don’t perspire easily; making you fasten your pace. On the other hand, jogging in UP is jogging in a warm, windy environment. After jogging for maybe 2 minutes, you could already feel your sweat running down your body. However, both settings still make me feel cool and comfortable, since both settings are surrounded by trees. Trees produce oxygen. A supply of oxygen that is more than enough and unpolluted makes it easier to jog and breathe.

Also, they are both different when it comes to the people you will see and meet when you jog. At Burnham, you often see people in groups. Sometimes, they even laugh and talk to each other while jogging. They even tease each other if one gives up and may even challenge each other to a race. Jogging for them is just to enjoy the company of others. However in UP, most often than not, people here jog independently. A good reason maybe is that they are focused more if they are alone. And since the academic oval was built to have a jogger’s and biker’s lane, people really jog here to condition themselves.

Lastly, one important aspect to delineate is their accessibility and security. In UP, the academic oval is free to everyone. Anyone can go there anytime, even at night. There are street lamps that light up the road so that you can still see much while you’re jogging. At Burnham however; people jog only during the day. Jogging at night could be dangerous since some parts of the trail are not well lit. You might stumble and fall. To sum all things up, both places pose different purposes and advantages. One is not better than the other since the objective of jogging is different in both places. They are really convenient for jogging. And it’s up to the person’s preference to where he wants to jog. 

By: Benedict Guinto

(Compare and Contrast)

Sources (Photos):

http://www.cityofpines.com/ (http://www.cityofpines.com/baguioglimpse/baguio10.jpg)

http://miccaldo.wordpress.com/ (http://miccaldo.files.wordpress.com/2013/10/img_0170.jpg)