The weather has been tough this week. Mostly it has just been cold but the pavement has been good. Today, it was cold (-5 degrees) and windy (15-30 MPH) and snowy. The roads had been plowed, but there wasn't an inch of dry pavement anywhere. It is too cold for salt, so all the plows could do is scrape of the loose stuff on top. This left a half inch or more of generally hard, crusty snow. Fortunately, the screws I put in my Wave Riders gave me enough grip no fear falling, but not enough grip to run at any reasonable pace.

I had planned a 16 mile run with 12 miles of MP, but with the road surface being so slick, it seemed pointless to try to run at any predefined pace. So instead I ran a TLT run. I started out with 3x1 mile at tempo effort. Note that I said effort, since the pace was well off of temp pace. These three miles were run into the wind and were mostly uphill. The worst mile was at 7:30. That is usually easy run pace for me. After that I continued into the wind for another 4 miles before turning around. The wind was really amazing in places. There was one stretch where the wind was blowing the snow across a field and onto a road. When the snow would hit the road it would swirl up like a “pillar of cloud”, pushing me back home, but I kept plugging along.

After turning around, I ran easier, although the lack of traction kept me slow. Near the end, I ran 2x2 mile at tempo effort, and was actually able to get one the first one in at 6:22. Of course this one was gently downhill and with the wind, although I still could feel my feet slipping with every step.

Overall, it was a good run. The pace was slow (one mile was over 9:00!) but the effort was where it should have been. The cold didn't bother me except for the last mile. My balaclava had frozen to my hair in place making it difficult to adjust. But no frozen eyelashes.

Victor

Cross-training: 0.0 miles
Running: 17.0 miles
Shoes: Mizuno Wave Riders w/ 14 sheet metal screws in each shoe
WTD running: 58.0 miles
WTD total: 58.0 miles

posted by Not So Competitive Runner at 4:00 PM