Lots of Milestones



See how happy cold runs can be?



Not the restaurant with the delicious bellinis, we've hit a few more significant milestones this week. We're all keeping up with the training schedule, even if it's not on the correct date, and feeling mighty proud of ourselves doing it. With Christmas season in full swing, we've had to switch around the long runs (830am on a Sunday after 8 hours of Christmas cheer just doesn't work), but have still stuck to them. Some of the weekday runs are happening at different times, but are still getting done. We've done ALL the hill training, which is tough, but really not as hard as we'd built up in our minds. And most of our training has been through ice and snow, something I never thought I'd be able to do! Crystal was in Toronto on the weekend and ran on her own, but Christi and I hit the reservoir again. It was Christi and Crystal's first ever 12K runs, and my 12K was a full 10 minutes faster than the last one I had timed, so we all felt pretty darn good.

 This was also Christi's first run around the reservoir, and we all like it so much we're going to do the whole thing next weekend for our 14K (Christmas parties abound this weekend, no 830 run for us). We've also noticed that these long cold runs are really making us all frosty. I guess if you're outside running long enough to freeze your 750ml water bottle entirely, the rest of you gets a little icy too...we noticed that strands of hair get frosted all the way down, and you get these little "frost blossoms" around your neck and shoulders where the sweat comes out and freezes. Our breath makes icicles on our eyelashes, and tragi-comic goatees on our faces.


Why is my hair getting old?



Seriously, if you had told me a year ago I would run for miles in temperature cold enough to freeze water in a bottle strapped to my back, I would have said you were crazy. But as it turns out, running in cold weather is fine, and even better in some ways...you sure don't get the sweat rolling down your face and back like in hot weather.



As long as you've bundled up properly (thanks Outlet Malls!) it's really nice to crunch through the snow in the sun with all that winter quiet. And running over ice and snow is fine as long as you're watching the ground closely.



It only looks like we're running with Gumby

OK, one last milestone this past weekend...sort of gross, but it really made me feel like a REAL runner...around the 10K mark on Saturday, I just couldn't wait any longer and peed in the woods in the snow. It was both my first mid-run bathroom break, and the first time I've had bare skin from the waist down in -10C. I'm happy to say I didn't fall over, pee on my shoes, nor accidentally moon a crowd of runners on the path. Some people might read this as a “you’re disgusting, thanks for sharing, creep”, but I felt like I'd achieved one of the secret runner's rituals.