be seen

Be Bright, Be Seen : Nathan Luna Fire 250 RX Run Chest/Waist Light product review

Disclaimer: I received a Nathan Luna Fire 250 RX Run Chest/Waist Light to review as part of being a BibRave Pro. Learn more about becoming a BibRave Pro (ambassador), and check out BibRave.com to review find and write race reviews!

About 4 years ago I took quite a fall during a nighttime run resulting in some bruises and gluing my forehead back together again, luckily not a brain injury. Since then when I am running late or very early and its dark I definitely am running with a light of some sort. I have tried mini flashlights and headlamps but none have really felt right. In the past I have even tried wearing my headlamps as lights around my torso, and that actually sorta worked for awhile. Now there’s this light which is specially designed to wear on your chest or waist, so like I was experimenting with in the past it’s now an actual design! This particular light has 5 light modes:

  • 33 Lumens ( Low)
  • 100 Lumens (Med)
  • 200 Lumens (Hi)
  • 250 Lumens (Boost)
  • 100 Lumens (White/Strobe)

I used the hi mode the most and it was VERY bright.

I tried this out along with my highly reflective Oiselle tank top on an after work run that was going to end up dark on the run home. I wore when my boyfriend and I took our daughter on a stroller run to the park to play, instead of wearing it with the strap, I clipped it to my shorts for that run and it worked pretty great, a little bouncy but after a mile I didn’t notice it so much. I also tried wearing it on my chest, under the boobs and it was okay but not as comfy as on the waist plus I hear from other local runners that the chest light placement can be blinding when coming up to another runner in the street. I encountered quite a few cars on the run back because we were running on the actual street because in some areas of my neighborhood there are no sidewalks. It seemed like all the cars could see me and were moving over to give us at least 3 ft of space to run. I plan on using the light again soon to clip onto the front of the stroller to use for navigating when running alone with my daughter on early morning/early dark evenings.

Overall I really like the design and the fit of this chest/weight strap but the strap can be a little loose even when tightened fully. The light stays bright and is charged by usb, so basically can be charged anywhere that you would normally charge your cell phone. Charged pretty quickly and the charge lasts for a long time of running. This light is reasonably price at  $39.99 and with the code it’s only $32.00!

Use the code: NATHANBIB20 – good sitewide at nathansports.com, one-time purchase of up to $250. So get your new Luna fire and perhaps some hydration systems/bottles while you are there.

Have you ever used a headlamp/hand torch while running?

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Brilliant Reflective Safety Strips- A product review

I have been on the search for a product to make my Bob running stroller more visible at night. I take it to run clubs pretty often and now that the time has changed it gets dark pretty much before run club even starts. I always try to wear bright colors on my evening runs and especially so when I bring the little one along but I still don’t feel too safe. I have looked into wheel lights (not sure if they fit my stroller wheels) and installing flashlights to illuminate our path but haven’t came up with anything solid.

That is where Brilliant Reflective steps in, I received a set of the stick on reflective strips as well as the iron on reflective strips. Immediately I knew that I would be applying the stick on ones to my running stroller to help us be more visible on night and early morning runs. Not sure when I will be using the iron on ones as I do not know exactly what I want to iron them permanently on but I’m sure I will figure something out soon. Most likely I will iron them onto  some winter gear, but since it’s not really feeling like winter here yet, I’ll have to wait.

Without Brilliant Reflective tape
With the tape, can you tell?

The brilliant reflective strips are very sturdy and easy to apply, I started with applying them around the stroller base and was done fairly quick and used all but one strip. The stick on strips come in 4 colors (black, red, blue, and purple) I got the black ones, which works well with the stroller because you don’t even notice they are added on in the daytime. The iron on strips come in the same colors as the stick on ones. I took a picture before applying the strips and one picture after and if you are not looking very closely, you cannot even tell a difference. The difference is when a flash of light hits them and then it is very noticeable where the stickers were applied.

I took the stroller out on an evening run, I do that fairly often when I cannot find someone to watch Phoebe in order to get my daily run in. We started running when the sun was just starting to set and before the final half a mile was done of our 3 miler it was already getting pretty dark. I’m so not a fan of this early sun setting season, I feel like my running gets a bit more dangerous to do and I usually shorten my weekday runs. My boyfriend was so kind to take these pictures while I ran back and forth along the road to get the best shot of how these reflective tapes work. Took some time to get the right shots as the flash is not the fastest on the iPhone 6s but I think it shows how the tape is visible in the darkness with a light shined on it. We even encountered a few cars while taking the photos and one of the pictures shows just how the tape lights up when the car is starting to pass by us. This is a great product and I will be definitely showing this post to all my mommy stroller runner friends, they could really benefit from this product as I have so far. I cannot wait to try it out again at run clubs this season. I plan on getting another pack of these stick on ones and putting them on my clothes as well to try it out, but I felt safer running with this on the stroller for sure.

As seen with car approaching

For more info and to order Brilliant Reflective strips.

Use code “BIBRAVE25” for 25% off the full order (one time use per customer). The code will expire on Tuesday at 11:59pm.

Disclaimer: I received a free sample of Brilliant Reflective Safety Strips as part of being a BibRave Pro. All opinions are my own.  Learn more about becoming a BibRave Pro (ambassador), and check out BibRave.com to review find and write race reviews!

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