Run to Win

In a continuing collaboration with Scott over at Straight to the Bar, we will be writing about do-it-yourself home exercise implements throughout February and March. This week, I’d like to talk about utilizing snow in your workouts.

If you live in a climate where there is a good amount of snowfall, then you don’t need a gym membership during the winter. Where I live, we’ve gotten 7 or 8 feet of snowfall so far this year and still have half the Winter yet to go. You can get quite a good workout by pushing snow back and forth.

The next time that it snows near you, try incorporating a few of these moves:
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I got lost in the middle of a lake today while I was out running. (If you have never done it before, then be sure to read the FAQ about Lake Running first!) You would think that it would be pretty difficult to get lost in the middle of a lake. After all, there are no hills you can see for miles because everything is exactly level, and there are even a few islands to use as landmarks that you can run around.

Photo by ezioman
Yet there I was, having done a loop and on my way back, trying to figure out exactly where it was that I had come onto the lake. I could have easily backtracked and found where my footprints in the snow were, but there’s the possibility that snowmobiles had obliterated some and besides, where’s the fun in that?

I have a very good sense of direction, so I pointed myself towards where I wanted to go and it wound up being right.

After a few steps, though, I decided to give the map functionality on my new watch a try. It is a Garmin ForeRunner 305. I haven’t had it long, so I don’t know all of the cool things you can do with it yet. I mostly use it for mapping my runs after the fact.

It turns out that I was going in the right direction and would soon have gotten to a spot of open water that I would have remembered running around on the ice. It makes me very comfortable knowing that the map was there, though, because now I can run trails wherever I want and at least have an idea of what direction I need to go to get home. Once I was back on the path I wanted to take, it even started to warn me about 15-30 feet before every turn that a turn was coming. That was pretty neat, but also a little annoying.

Photo #59 by Don Penta
The run itself was a lot of fun. I ran 15 miles on snowmobile trails, with about a third of that on the surface of the lake. Anytime a snowmobile came near me I had to jump off to the side, where I would sink into knee deep snow. I also got some strange looks when they got close enough to realize I wasn’t wearing a shirt. Hey, it was hot out! It was at least 35 degrees.

Speaking of running without a shirt, the pictures for last week’s Resolution Run are now available. By the time it started snowing during that run, I had stripped down to just my singlet. You can see all of the pictures from the run (the photo to the left is cropped from #59) over at the Maine Running Photos website.

This week last year, I looked back at both my training, my health, and my writing. I think that this has helped me improve all three areas this year.

• I looked at the final numbers for 2006. Last year, I ran less than 1400 miles, held a pretty steady weight and wrote 560 articles. This year, I ran over 1800 miles and my weight had even less swing than last year. I wrote more this year, and I’ll talk about this year’s final numbers a little more in a couple of days.
• The first snow run finally came by this week last year. This year, the first snow run was weeks ago. Snow is great for building strength; this year, rather than dealing with traffic I have been seeking out the snow and taking to the trails.
• I finished the workout locations series of articles by explaining how planning workouts around vacations can be accomplished.
• One of the Coast to Coast runners, Chris Schauerman, made news thanks to his undergraduate research in nanotechnology and physics at RIT.
• I continued my animated series by showinghow to do a crooked arm lateral raise. I also suggested that you loosen your watch band when lifting weights to prevent cutting off your circulation.

This morning I woke up to snow and some rapid accumulation. It has snowed before this year, but it had all melted before I began running again after my last marathon. As such, today has to be the latest in the season that I have ever had a first snow run; that includes when I spent the winter in Florida.

Running in the snow is not much different than running in the rain, except that you will probably be warmer. Dress in layers, protect your eyes, and cover your head to keep yourself warm and dry in both types of conditions.

Some differences to consider when running in the snow is that your footing may be much less sure. The plows did not start passing my house until at least 2 hours after I finished my run this morning, so there was no sand and all the snow was where it fell or where random vehicle traffic kicked it. I dug out my stabilicers, which are crampons for running shoes. I really need to replace the cleats, which I will probably do this afternoon after they dry. They still kept my feet planted on the slick roads, which was the important thing. I also used my headlamp with the red LED lit, just to provide a tiny bit more visibility to myself while I was out there.

I love running when it is snowing. I prefer it when there is no traffic to speak of, but driving somewhere to go running was not really an option I would have considered today. Layering up, making myself visible, and making sure that I had some grip on my shoes gave me a pleasurable run. Take a look out your window; maybe you can have a fun snow run as well.