21 min
A Mid-Winter Tale RunRunLive 5.0 - Running Podcast
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- Running
The RunRunLive 4.0 – A Mid-Winter Tale (Audio: link) audio:http://www.RunRunLive.com/PodcastEpisodes/AMWT.mp3] Link Hello folks this is Chris. Unfortunately I wasn’t able to find the time to podcast this week. I don’t know about you folks but I’ve had a crazy couple of weeks. Actually it’s been pretty crazy since before the holidays. I won’t bore you with the details but my job has been super time consuming. I’ve got calls starting in the morning every day and also in the evenings. And you know the morning time is my writing time. But, I’ll give you an update. I wrapped up my week of training last week with a stellar 30K long run on the roads. We got more than a foot of snow and it was too soft to do a multi-hour long run in. I was worried about switching to the road so abruptly. And I did pick up a little soreness in my plantar, but for the most part it was a great run. Let me tell you the story. I set out from my house in the direction of the rail trail in the next town over. I figured if the snow was going to be packed down and passable anywhere it would be on the rail trail. I can get to the midpoint of the trail about 10K from my house, so I headed out nice and slow in that direction. It was a sunny day, no wind, but pretty cold. I did my errands in the morning and waited for it to warm up a bit. The roads were dry but with the snow there were some places where the shoulders got a bit skinny. I wanted to avoid too much hill work and stay on back roads. I wore my vest with the two 500ML mammary bottles under my outer layer because it was in the high-teens, low twenties. After the previous week’s bad adventure with the spoiled gel I decided to go full ultra-fuel and keep it simple. I made a nice organic peanut butter and honey sandwich on Dave’s 21 grain bread. I cut it into 3X3 chunks – so 9 bite-size pieces and threw them into a plastic bag and stuffed them in a pocket. When I got to the trail It was impassable. I stopped to eat a couple pieces of sandwich, take a drink and figure out what to do next. As I was standing by the side of the road, basically having a stand up picnic, cars kept stopping and waving me across. And I was like, “no, I’m not crossing.” I finally had to scootch back into a driveway to stay out of their line of site. I figured I was an hour in and felt pretty good, so I’d just keep going east and see where I ended up. I vaguely knew where I was. I headed out through the back roads of Westford and east into Carlisle. Babe Ruth lived in Carlisle when he played for the Red Sox. Eventually I came to a main road. I was trying to figure out where I was. I only needed a few more minutes, so I mentally flipped a coin and turned left. I’m glad I did because in a couple hundred feet I came upon Great Brook State Park. This is a good-sized park in Carlisle that I’m familiar with having mountain biked in there a few time. I learned that I am about 9 miles away from the park crow-fly if I take the back roads. Which is cool. With the snow, they had opened it up as a snowshoe and cross-country ski venue. The place was packed. On the east side they were selling tickets to get in and ski. I asked if I could go into the trails on the west side where people were snowshoeing. They said it was ok. The trails were packed down and perfect for running and it was beautiful. The sun was high and families were out. I just ripped around in the woods for a few minutes. Then I popped back out on the road and headed back home after eating some more sandwich and taking a drink. Really beautiful day. On my way out I had noticed that it was apparently trash day in Carlisle because all the trask cans were out at the end of driveways. I began playing the beer can game that I like to play. The way this works of course is that you pick up a beer can that some a-hole has tossed out the car window and you drop it in the ne
The RunRunLive 4.0 – A Mid-Winter Tale (Audio: link) audio:http://www.RunRunLive.com/PodcastEpisodes/AMWT.mp3] Link Hello folks this is Chris. Unfortunately I wasn’t able to find the time to podcast this week. I don’t know about you folks but I’ve had a crazy couple of weeks. Actually it’s been pretty crazy since before the holidays. I won’t bore you with the details but my job has been super time consuming. I’ve got calls starting in the morning every day and also in the evenings. And you know the morning time is my writing time. But, I’ll give you an update. I wrapped up my week of training last week with a stellar 30K long run on the roads. We got more than a foot of snow and it was too soft to do a multi-hour long run in. I was worried about switching to the road so abruptly. And I did pick up a little soreness in my plantar, but for the most part it was a great run. Let me tell you the story. I set out from my house in the direction of the rail trail in the next town over. I figured if the snow was going to be packed down and passable anywhere it would be on the rail trail. I can get to the midpoint of the trail about 10K from my house, so I headed out nice and slow in that direction. It was a sunny day, no wind, but pretty cold. I did my errands in the morning and waited for it to warm up a bit. The roads were dry but with the snow there were some places where the shoulders got a bit skinny. I wanted to avoid too much hill work and stay on back roads. I wore my vest with the two 500ML mammary bottles under my outer layer because it was in the high-teens, low twenties. After the previous week’s bad adventure with the spoiled gel I decided to go full ultra-fuel and keep it simple. I made a nice organic peanut butter and honey sandwich on Dave’s 21 grain bread. I cut it into 3X3 chunks – so 9 bite-size pieces and threw them into a plastic bag and stuffed them in a pocket. When I got to the trail It was impassable. I stopped to eat a couple pieces of sandwich, take a drink and figure out what to do next. As I was standing by the side of the road, basically having a stand up picnic, cars kept stopping and waving me across. And I was like, “no, I’m not crossing.” I finally had to scootch back into a driveway to stay out of their line of site. I figured I was an hour in and felt pretty good, so I’d just keep going east and see where I ended up. I vaguely knew where I was. I headed out through the back roads of Westford and east into Carlisle. Babe Ruth lived in Carlisle when he played for the Red Sox. Eventually I came to a main road. I was trying to figure out where I was. I only needed a few more minutes, so I mentally flipped a coin and turned left. I’m glad I did because in a couple hundred feet I came upon Great Brook State Park. This is a good-sized park in Carlisle that I’m familiar with having mountain biked in there a few time. I learned that I am about 9 miles away from the park crow-fly if I take the back roads. Which is cool. With the snow, they had opened it up as a snowshoe and cross-country ski venue. The place was packed. On the east side they were selling tickets to get in and ski. I asked if I could go into the trails on the west side where people were snowshoeing. They said it was ok. The trails were packed down and perfect for running and it was beautiful. The sun was high and families were out. I just ripped around in the woods for a few minutes. Then I popped back out on the road and headed back home after eating some more sandwich and taking a drink. Really beautiful day. On my way out I had noticed that it was apparently trash day in Carlisle because all the trask cans were out at the end of driveways. I began playing the beer can game that I like to play. The way this works of course is that you pick up a beer can that some a-hole has tossed out the car window and you drop it in the ne
21 min