Urban Off-Trail Running!

Time of departure: 7:37pm-ish
Return: 9:33pm-ish

Temperature: 34F
I got home and left in a rush. I didn’t have time to gather the usual stats.

Route: Hmm. What a funny question this one is today. We were on the lakefront… Largely, we followed some cross-country ski tracks. Pretty cool.
Approx Distance: 5.5-ish miles. Difficult to judge since we never once ran on a path.
Running buddy: Matt
Clothing: RCW. I think I need to get new shoes soon. I feel like I need more arch support.

The Drive Activity: not noteworthy
Dog beach Activity: none
People tally:
0 Walkers
0 Runners
0 Cyclists
1 Person with dog
8 Sledders on Montrose hill. But 3 didn’t stay long; they said the conditions were unfavorable.
________________________________

This weekend some of my friends and I went to Michigan to go skiing. Originally, the plan had been to do some cross-country skiing (which would have been a workout) and possibly some downhill. But due to the recent high temperatures enough snow had melted so that cross-country was no longer an option. We all went downhill skiing instead and I ended up having a fantastic time! Perhaps I‘ll write a story about that.

But the story here is that downhill skiing, in the manner in which I was skiing, was no workout. And so come Sunday afternoon I was itchin’ to run. I was thinking if we don’t run tonight, we wouldn’t run til Tuesday morning and I’ll loose some fitness. What has happened to me?? Loose fitness?? But, yes, that is what I was thinking. A few days without a run are a few days wasted. You can’t get them back. Luckily, Matt decided he was available and so we were off!

Before I even met up with Matt, both my feet were wet. There was slush everywhere. Slushy-watery-slushy-slush that was often about an inch deep. It sprayed everywhere and soaked into my shoes and socks when I stepped in it. I tried running on the street, but most streets were surprisingly slippery (and drivers really hate to see runners on the street) so I returned to the sidewalk.

I announced to Matt that this was our messiest run so far. He didn’t seem convinced. Apparently, they keep the sidewalks and streets cleaner in his ward. A few blocks always seems to make a difference in this city. But it didn’t take too long for him to begin to agree with me. We’ve had runs that were wetter. They’re not blogged about, but man, they should have been! There were a couple of runs we made in the rain where we were totally soaked, drenched, and caught in torrential rain pour. There was one that was even so bad we had to turn back early, running in that particular rainstorm was like running against a wall of water. Maybe I’m exaggerating, but nonetheless, we had had wetter runs. There’s a difference between wet and messy. This was messy.

Where that icy patch had been the other day, where the cyclists had fallen, the path had about 2-3 inches of watery slush covering it. It reminded me of the juice at the bottom of a kitchen garbage bag. Running in that!? I’d rather not. That’s messy. Thankfully, in his infinite wisdom, Matt made a motion to, “abandon the path altogether and run off trail.” This seems like a good time to mention how we negotiate a route.

It used to work like this: I would decide I wanted to run in a particular direction and I would either point in that direction, steer Matt with my body, or say, “let‘s run that way.” But after many months of me calling the shots, Matt, I think, had had enough. So he introduced a new method of route navigation and negotiation utilizing Robert’s Rules of Order. So now it is supposed to work like this:

“I move that we run over the bridge.” (As was the case when there was a foot and a half of water under the bridge where we would usually run).
“I second that we run over the bridge.”
“It has been moved and seconded that we run over the bridge…” and Matt takes it from here, when he chooses to, I forget how it goes. Something about it being debated on the floor and voted on…

How diplomatic, right? Yes, but this still cracks me up.

So it had been moved and seconded and the motion had passed to abandon the running and bike paths all together and run off trail. Instead of running in 1 to 2 inches of slush we ran in 1 ½ to 2 inches of snow on uneven terrain while dodging tree branches. It was like hiking. But we were running! We were jumping over mud puddles, around slush pools, and skirting around creeks and rivers (these were on other days known as streets, but this night they were creeks). Being off trail there seemed to be more variation in terrain elevation as well, so there were more opportunities for gentle sprints uphill. Sometimes we’d misjudge the ground texture and get a freshly wet sock and shoe. Sometimes we’d have to backtrack because we‘d find ourselves on a peninsula of dry land. Fun times!

Adventure running? I think so. But we decided this wasn’t the most adventurous run possible. More adventurous would have been changing conditions. So if the temperature was to have dropped and the slush turned to ice, and then it got really really cold, and then if it’d started to snow again…that would be more adventurous. Even so, this run was so fun it went by terribly fast. I couldn’t believe we were done when we were. It had felt more like 2 miles or 20 minutes or so. Time is such a funny animal.

It’s fun to dodge branches and jump over little water creeks! It really makes me feel like a kid again, like when I used to pretend to be some sort of Antarctic adventurer. For example, there was a time when the lake was half frozen and I took the kayak out. I had walked out onto the ice until it started to crack, then I laid down and crawled until even that dispersion of my weight was to much for the ice to handle. I got in the kayak and rocked it until the ice cracked and kept rocking it and paddling until I got out to open water. Man, that was stupid. If I had flipped, or had fallen through the ice, I would have been in serious trouble. But I just had this kayaking itch I had to satisfy. I wonder if my parents ever knew about that one…

This was an awesome run. We ran at a pretty decent clip, even if we'd been running on a dry path, and we were running off trail! So cool! Oh, how running is so much fun!

It is amazing to me that we actually ran through this entire winter. We never missed a run. I remember discussing with Matt early in the season what we would do when conditions became too unsavory. When it is so cold that the snot instantly crystallizes in your nostrils, when your eyelashes freeze together, I didn’t think you could run in that! I thought we’d have to find an indoor track or some dreaded treadmills. Oh, how I hate running on treadmills. Whenever I start running on them, I can’t make it past 2 miles before I find myself running off it, out the doors of the gym, into the fresh air. They’re only good for interval training, not for distance, at least not for me. But, no, this winter has been free of treadmills and free of short tracks! We did it!! I’m so proud of us.

We realized this, embracing a sense of accomplishment, as we took in the scene down by Montrose harbor. Observing all the deep picturesque pools of melted snow under a bridge and the congregating Canada geese, we knew that spring will follow. In short time the adventure will be contending with 90+ degree heat and stifling humidity. There is never a dull season in the Midwest.