Monday, January 17, 2011

Winter Running It Is Not Nice

This weekend the workout was a long swim on Saturday and a short run. Reindeer Mary and I got our swim in, then changed and decided to run from the Y to Lincoln Park and back. This feat would cover about 5 miles.
My Garmin revolted, refusing to find a signal. Rebooting didn't help so we decided to just run 30 minutes and then turn around.

Driving in to the pool that morning, the temp had been around 32. It dropped a couple of degrees while we were swimming and the wind picked up. Agreeing that this sucked, we cut the run short and got in a scant 3 miles.

I resolved I would get a longer run in on Sunday. These types of decisions usually backfire.

Temperature Sunday morning at 5 a.m. was a whopping 7 degrees with a wind chill of -2. . Figured I would wait it out and try to run at 7 when the sun was up. But at 6, the temp had dropped. Sensing a cooling trend, I bundled up and hit the streets. How bad could it be?

My original plan was for 9 miles. At 6 miles, the GU I had brought along had frozen to the consistency of sherbet and there were sheets of frost on my legs. I had forgotten to carry water, which would have frozen anyway, and was reduced to eating snow to dilute the GU.

Defeated by winter, I opted for 8 agonizingly slow miles.

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