Outhustle the Houston Heat: A Comprehensive Guide to Running in the Houston Summer

Grace holds up angel wings in honor of the Pi Beta Phi sorority and her fundraising for children’s literacy and education through her completion of the Houston Marathon.

One humid July morning, Grace DeJong was running through her Memorial neighborhood when suddenly, the houses around her started to spin. Barely a mile and a half into her run, Grace had heat exhaustion. Just the day before, she had returned from a 10-day Nantucket vacation, where she ran almost every day. She also had recently graduated from Memorial High School as a cross-country and track runner. She was in peak shape. But the sudden reintroduction to the Houston heat and humidity after cooler Nantucket temperatures was too much that day.

Inching herself to a nearby park bench, Grace sat down and did what any 18-year-old in crisis would do: she called her mom to pick her up.

Even at 7 a.m., 80 degrees and 85 percent humidity can sideline even the most experienced of runners. 

The Houston heat can be daunting, but with a little preparation, nothing should keep you from going on summer runs that you actually enjoy while staying safe. This time of year, there are myriad challenges that plague Houston runners: high temperatures, summer storms, busy travel plans, mundane running routes – the list goes on.

Nevertheless, we are aspiring to help you increase your times and your enjoyment of the sport. So learn a little bit about our running backgrounds and check out our tips below!

Growing up in Houston, both of us learned to navigate the ubiquitous heat and humidity. 

Grace DeJong is a 200-hour Registered Yoga Teacher who ran the Chevron Houston Marathon in January. She grew up doing cross country, track and field, and competitive dance. Grace trains with TriCats, the University of Arizona club triathlon team, and enjoys running outside solo or alongside friends. The UofA junior has used running to stay both mentally and physically fit through college.

Demi Pappas is all smiles after a run around Memorial Park’s three-mile loop. 

Demi Pappas is a soccer player, but her freshman year of college she fell in love with running, as it provided her a way to explore the city and her thoughts whilst living in D.C. Demi has run multiple half-marathons and competed in triathlons with the Georgetown University Triathlon Club. Running has both boosted her fitness on the soccer field and helped her sort through the mayhem of her early 20s. 

Here, we have put our heads together to help you increase your times and your enjoyment of the sport:  

Try out a New Route

For us, jogging down the same humdrum path can get tedious. Sometimes, experimenting with a new route is all you need to liven things up. Below are a few new spots to try out in Houston: we even went and ran them for you! Check out the videos here. 

• White Oak Bayou 
• Memorial Park’s NEW Kinder Land Bridge, Cyvia and Melvyn Wolff Prairie, & Small Loop around the Clay Family Eastern Glades
• Newcastle Street on Bellaire

Embrace the Heat

Let’s face it: Houston is a hard place to live for runners, no matter the season. Even when the sun isn’t mercilessly beating down, there’s the humidity. Houston has an average relative humidity of about 75 percent. That said, ignoring the reality of Houston weather conditions won’t help you. Instead, embrace it and use it to your advantage!

Grace is good at motivating herself to get out early before the heat takes hold. Demi prefers evening runs around 7-8:30 p.m., where it’s cooler but still light outside. Running in this sweet spot is important, especially for us female runners. Even if Demi plans on getting home before twilight, she always tries to wear neon clothes (there is no shame in looking like a highlighter!) and always, always keeps her phone on her during a run. 

In terms of nutrition, enhancing your hydration with electrolyte mixes work wonders. We love to use Nuun and Liquid IV. For long runs (over 45 minutes) don’t be afraid to use gels! The simple sugars in energy gels are easily digestible and go directly into the bloodstream as glucose, which gives you a tangible boost in energy.

Map Out Your Runs

Feel prepared for your run by creating a route for yourself. Half of the battle is choosing the distance and location of your run. When you feel unsure of your destination or your target mileage, you aren’t reaching the full potential of your run. 

Utilize apps like Footpath to plan your route. Features on mapping apps show you everything from terrain and elevation to the nearest restrooms. Having a plan before you lace up your running shoes can provide you with confidence in the direction of your run and motivation to finish your workout.

Wear Something Cute

When you look good, you feel good. In the same way dressing up for work impacts productivity, dressing for success in your workout boosts motivation and drive.

Demi completed the hilly Austin Half-Marathon alongside Lauren Ohler, Andrea Lechin, and Ashley Kennnedy, who convinced her to run the 13.1 miles in an Outdoor Voices exercise dress!

Choose athletic clothing that you feel most comfortable and confident in. Throw on your favorite pair of running shorts and grab a matching top, and don’t be afraid to accessorize with a vented trucker hat or polarized sunglasses to keep the summer sun at bay.

A great addition to your ‘fit is a running sling. Grace uses a FP Movement running pouch to keep her hands free and her phone with her at all times. Light pouches like these allow you to have your necessities on your body while minimizing extra weight.  

Do a Treadmill Workout

When we aren’t able to go outside – whether it be because of insurmountable heat or rain – a treadmill run is the way to go. Both of us frequent our school gyms and love to get a run in between classes, and at home it is no different. Demi likes to do guided runs on Peloton or Youtube, while Grace keeps it classic with music. 

Treadmills are also a tool to practice running on hills, especially in a city devoid of hills like Houston! When Demi was training for the Austin half-marathon, the incline feature was a godsend. If you want to run on flat ground, we recommend setting your incline to 0.5 to stimulate outside conditions such as air resistance and uneven terrain. That way when you do run outside, it won’t feel harder. 

Join a Community

If you don’t have experience in cross country, running with others is daunting. For example, Demi refuses to run alongside more than two people because it gives her anxiety. Nevertheless, joining an online community of runners helps immensely. For starters, you pick up a great deal of knowledge when connected to a network of runners – more knowledge than we could ever give you in a 1,500-word article. Proximity to other like-minded athletes also helps with motivation and support. Over the years, we have encountered countless dilemmas – cramps, dips in motivation, knee twinges – that lead us to inevitably doubt ourselves and our abilities. But after reaching out to our runner friends or spending a couple minutes on “RunningTok” (the running corner of TikTok), we are always soothed, invigorated by the knowledge that it is in fact not just us.

Online communities are also a fantastic place to share in the joyous moments of running, to chronicle the serendipitous jog you had that morning, celebrate a new personal milestone, or reflect on a recent race. In our fast-paced society, we are conditioned to immediately move on to the next thing without acknowledging what we have just achieved. We will spend months training for a race, and the second it’s over, start obsessing over the next one. Looking forward is important, but it’s also crucial to celebrate the victories along the way. 

The free fitness app Strava is currently the home base for the international running community. Both a running log and social network, Strava allows you to record your workouts with GPS tracking and share them with your friends. Grace uses Strava to search for running location recommendations, looking at the runs that her friends have recently completed and enjoyed. You can encourage your friends by giving them a “kudos” when they have recorded a new activity or hit a goal. Other apps like Garmin Connect and Nike Run Club are also great resources for logging and sharing runs. In addition, TikTok and Instagram Reels have a multitude of running influencers that create positive and helpful content. 

Cross Train

Grace shows off her favorite arm balance, Eka Pada Koundinyasana, in Memorial Park.

Cross training is important for both mind and body. It decreases bone stress and provides your running muscles with a much-needed break, which helps with injury prevention. Additionally, cross training reinvigorates the mind, boosts fitness, and increases motivation. 

As for active recovery, we love cycling or spinning. Swimming also alleviates muscle pain and is perfect for the summer. Other forms of cross training include Pilates, yoga, and strength training, the latter of which is largely overlooked by runners. Many mistakenly believe that lifting weights may hinder running performance when in fact it does the opposite. Strength training, specifically with a focus on mobility, has helped us run stronger and increase our times. 

Just Enjoy It

We hope these tips help you along your Houston running journey and you remember that, at the end of the day, running is a recreational activity, one that we do to clear our minds and boost our mood. We can get very serious about running, but after all, it’s really all about the endorphins. Put eloquently by Elle Woods, “Exercise gives you endorphins. Endorphins make you happy….” Do we need to say the rest?

So, be happy. Let yourself experience the joy of it all. Go easy on yourself, go with grace, and remember that the hardest part is just lacing up your shoes. 

Editor's note: For more on this topic, read Going the Extra Mile: Melanie Margolis marks a personal run streak by Jennifer Oakley and Where to Run in Houston: Now there's no reason not to by Pooja Salhotra.