Belleville Beatdown Coming! Week of 2-2 to 2-8

I blame myself.  With zero snow up till last week, I'd piped up with "I hope we have some snow for Belleville!"  Well, we got it in spades, and it's shaping up to be an even bigger shitshow than last year's sufferfest, which took me 1:06 to finish, and was described by 81-year old Colburn Graves as "The toughest thing I've ever done."  That's testimony right there.  It was brutal.

Monday, 2-2 - 0 Miles - Yet another storm, and another two rounds of shoveling the driveway.  All set here...

Tuesday, 2-3 - 0 Miles.

Wednesday, 2-4 - 2.8 Miles (Trail/Road) + 3.3 Miles (Road) - Attempt at a trail run in Champlin, and a time-killing progression run before B-Ball practice ended.  Was finally able to make it to karate class this morning!  Great class, we went through all our kata and yakosoku kumite drills, and spent some time doing self-defense.  Good stuff!  I was planning on hitting Watch Hill to run, but on my way there I decided to scope out Champlin Glacier Park.  Footprints on the first trail!  I quickly geared up and put the Yaks on for the first time this year...

100 yards into the woods the green trail branches off to the left and it's my favorite.  I take it and immediately, I'm working.  Hard.  The snow is still pretty deep and has a nice crusty topping to punch through.  I went a mile in it, the snow averaging shin-deep, and bailed onto the road for a bit, then found a tracked-up trail and looped that a couple of times.

Champlin trail?

Crusty!

More crust...

In the afternoon, I got to my daughter's school early and decided on a hilly-ish progression run.  Started at an 8:06, ended at a 6:33 pace.  Felt good and was thinking about trying to loop around on Jeremy Hill road but ran outta time (It's about a 6-mile loop).  3.3 miles was it, but a good run nevertheless...

Thursday, 2-5 - 0 Miles.

Friday, 2-6 - 5 Miles (Road) - Mystic.  COLD!!!  My wife was getting her hair done, so I ran and answered various texts from her about her timeline, which ran late.  Turned into a progression run of sorts, although I was laying off before the race...

Saturday, 2-7 - 6.2 Miles (Trail? Snow? IDK???) - Belleville Pond 10k, NKRI.  One Hell of a race, and a true "Sufferfest" to get through.  My take?  I packed all my gear and left the house, got on I-95 and quickly realized that I forgot.to.put.my.damn.shoes.in.the.car...and turned around to get them, which ate up all my time for a warmup.  I got to Ryan Park with 10-15 minutes to spare, got checked in and chatted with some friends.  Perfect day.  25 degrees, overcast and no wind.  Providence vagabonds Monica and James showed up, ready to run and kicking off their 2015 season...Beth???  Not so much, I called her during my shoe crisis and she growled out something about "I'm not going..."

The race was as I expected:  I went out at an average pace.  I saw George up ahead and decided to catch him and stay with him for a while, which we did.  I finally passed him and tried to reel in runners as I went, but that mile 3 was awful!  I averaged a 14-15 minute mile.  The packed snow after that was like a gift, and I increased the pace, finishing in 1:05.  Official results to follow, but what a great way to spend a Saturday morning in New England!!!  Anyone who hasn't gone to the woods in winter, and walked in the snow, is missing out!  It's so great to have so many runners out there!!!

I'll also offer this:  I noticed that my friend Monica hadn't finished, and James and I went to the finish line to greet her.  A runner named Betsy was coming in, and we cheered her in.  She was awesome!  Gave us high-fives and everything.  She's a breast cancer survivor, and her goal was to finish the race this year...so my hat is off to Betsy, and I'm lucky to have met her!  She also told us that Mo was right behind her, and there she was!  Monica, total badass, crossing the line in a tough race, with us yelling at her to pick it up.  Love it!!!  Great to cheer friends to victory :)

Sunday, 2-8 - 6.2 Miles (Road) - Mystic again?  Had to pick up a prescription in Mystic, so it was to be a chlly and breezy 10k along the water.  I really didn't have a particular time or distance in mind, either, just meandered around until I got to around 4 miles, and decided to get 6.2 total, to finish off the Strava 10k challenge.  I don't really have anything I'm training for, so aside from working on speed, I don't really NEED to get a set number of miles in each day/week.  Is that really such a bad thing?