Fartlek run - 10 miles w/ 8 x 30 sec. at 5K-3K pace. Average pace: 10:18.
Weather at 6 am: 7°F, 85% humidity, wind 8.1 mph N, a thin layer of snow on the ground and snowing lightly.
I felt a little overdressed at first, but that was because I was running south, with the wind behind me. Once I turned north and started heading back towards home, I was plenty cold. My kids thought I looked pretty funny when I got home, all bundled up and covered with frost.
For the first part of the run I was the first person to make footsteps in the snow. That changed when I started passing high schools (3 of them) and it was time for school to start. My shoes make kind of a squeaky sound on the snow. You know in the cartoons when people are always slipping on banana peels? I saw a banana peel on the sidewalk this morning, as if the sidewalks weren't already slippery enough with the snow. But I didn't step on it and I didn't slip.
I tried to take my fast parts a little slower than I have been and I did manage to slow them down. I should probably slow them down about 10-20 seconds/mile more. It's hard to see my pace on my Garmin while I'm running them because I only run for 30 seconds and the Garmin has a hard time adjusting the pace quick enough, and I set it to the screen where I'm seeing the lap time so that I can time the 30 seconds. This screen doesn't include current pace. I guess I could modify it so that it would. In any case, the pace on my fast 30 second portions was 8:46 (uphill), 7:53, 8:07, 7:56, 7:52, 8:07, 8:12, 7:56.
I actually felt pretty good today. But I'm not sure I want to go out in the cold again. I'm thinking of working from home even though the roads aren't that bad.
It's supposed to snow all day today, though it isn't snowing very hard, and it's supposed to be even colder tomorrow morning. I'll have to see if I have the intestinal fortitude, as it were, to get out in the cold and snow for another 10 miles (but just easy, without the fartlek) tomorrow. | 