Hi all! It’s been a while….hope you’ve enjoyed your weekend (holiday weekend for all the US peeps)

This winter has been one wild ride! We’ve been hit with storm after storm. Somehow I’ve managed to maintain just about every workout. I’ve been very crafty 😉

Saturday morning some of my glorious running peeps came to Staten Island to run the Cold Feat 10K, a local trail race. We ran it together last year and had so much fun that it was a definite to have a repeat performance. In the world of overpriced races this is a breath of fresh air. $30 and you get lots of great swag and hot chocolate too….great volunteers and a really tight knit community of runners. If you’re local and interested you can learn more here.

swag! instead of a t-shirt we got nice fleece ear warmer/headbands

Lisa, Mike and me at the start

Me and Elvia along the course

Mind you, last year it was warmer and MUDDY! This year, snow….LOTS OF SNOW! Fresh fallen snow on top of older snow. Probably at least a foot on the ground (although the trail we ran on had been packed down some from the runners in front of us) and just as we began the run it started to snow even more! My Garmin said we actually only completed 5.66 miles but it felt like forever. As a matter of fact it took me an hour and 27 minutes to complete but I felt like I had been sprinting. Effort level was through the roof. The race director said we’d feel as if we ran a marathon in the sand when we were done. He wasn’t kidding.

Both Mike and Elvia placed in their age group (50-59)

Winning! (3rd place)

Winning! First place

And Lisa gave new meaning the to event title. Cold Feat became Cold FEET. She had some major foot carnage. Multiple blisters led her to make the dramatic finish by removing her sneaker and sock. I think she was trying to one-up Mike from his blister situation last fall when we were running in Nebraska on day 5 of the Center of The Nation Series.

ouchie!

the start/finish area…this is actually a golf course. so pretty.

there were some fallen tree limbs. Lisa opted to climb over. I crawled under =)

after the race. snowflakes still stuck to my hair.

A great shot of Mike almost at the finish. Photo by Neil Flip (King of the Mountain Events)

Stepping gingerly…Photo by Neil Flip (King of the Mountain Events)

After the race we came back to my place for lunch. Eggs, Bagels, chips, nuts, fruit and coffee.

Yesterday morning I started the day off with a walk with the dog in the woods… I let him streak naked (no winter coat) out in the snow. He doesn’t complain about wearing a coat but when I leave it off he’s definitely happier!

i stepped in something cold ma!

mmm it tastes delicious too!

Then, around 11am when the temps warmed up to the mid 20s I finally set out for my 14 mile training run. I have to admit, it wasn’t anywhere near as hard as I was expecting it to be. Thank god! It’s nice and flat there (a national park/beach area). The running paths weren’t cleared so I just ran on the street like I did previously. I had to do 4 round trips of the same route to get to 13.75 and then ran a quarter mile past my car to hit 14.

i was still trying to decide which sneakers to wear.

This boat name describes my run perfectly.

hello happy!

looks like about a foot of snow. LOL!

I averaged a 10:51 pace. And that’s even with walking through some slushy areas that were a bit slippery. Flat makes things so much easier. And since I’m training for a marathon that’s pretty flat I don’t have to feel bad.

With all the running, navigating uneven snowy and icy terrain, and shoveling I spent since being on vacation I’m actually exhausted and sore and can’t believe I go back to work tomorrow!!!! I plan on getting to bed super early and I’m skipping my run tomorrow. I’ll try and just take a walk instead. Must recharge.

So that’s my long weekend recap. How was your weekend? What exciting things happened?

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