MORE CRUNCHY SNOW, AND MORE FORECAST

Well, another Saturday, and another super run in the cold and snow. Today was perfect. It was cold enough to keep my body temperature down, but warm enough not to get cold when running. I wore my orienteering shoes again too. Toes a bit sore afterwards. Funnily, there was an orienteering competition in my local wood too so there were loads of positive looking runners, and a few totally lost ones. I like orienteering in the snow. You can see how many people go the same way as you - and how many don't. Normally I would have wanted to have a map and compass too but lately I have had a feeling that I have to get my fitness back properly and that can only be done by lots and lots of repeated steady running.

I have that feeling that it will take me another 6 months of what I am doing now and more before I feel ready to launch into racing seriously. I can feel that my rhythm is starting to become stronger but I cannot hold the tempo for more than 30 mins yet. But I do want to race. I miss the excitement of competition. The youngsters round here had better watch out.

Anyway the weather forecast is for more snow, so there may be a few more Saturdays in the cold yet

CRUNCHY SNOW

It was a seriously crunchy sound when running today. I started out with my normal shoes for running in snow and then realised that the road was like ice. Back I went to the flat and dragged my orienteering shoes out of the back of the cupboard. They have got serious metal studs in them. Running was great once I had these on. It had thawed yesterday with +5 and last night it froze again so everywhere was either ice or crunchy snow. I really enjoyed my run in the woods. Loads of kids on sledges and plenty of good tracks to run on. I started at 1400, the sky was clear and the sun was up - or to be precise going down - thats one joy of living so far north. In places it had already dropped below the trees and the temperature was starting to get crispy (that's a very technical weather term for -5) I was surprised not to get any blisters from the shoes though as I haven't had them on since the early summer when I was training for Jukola in Finland. But the feeling of security when running on the icy bits was great.

I have been keeping my runs to around 30 mins most days. This is the longest that I can run day after day without overstress and being too tired to work in the afternoon. I know that I can run longer just by slowing down but that does not suit me at all. My whole running history has been about clipping along at a good tempo and I am not about to stop that now, whatever the training books say is most effective. I also don't get warm if I run too slowly so there is good reason on cold days like recently for getting on with it. I hope that this snow stays for a while because I want to get back out on my skis again.