I hope everyone had a great Valentine’s Day or at least a good day of running. 😍

This morning I decided to go ahead and do something different. I have been running on roads for far too long, and it was beginning to get boring. The best way I know to break up the monotony of road running is to head for the hills…well trails, actually snowmobile trails up back.

I debated doing it over the last couple of days, and since the temps warmed up to around 20*F, I figured that it was safer to do it now than when the temps are in the single-digits.

Starting, I figured that I needed to warm-up for at least a half-mile, so I headed around Howard Circle and then went up the old Quaker Road extension, which is an overgrown road that is more trail than a road. I walked it this morning with Bennie, so I had a pretty good idea of the conditions.

One problem, my new Under Armor mask was fogging up my glasses so badly that I couldn’t see after 100 yards. So I took the glasses off and somehow managed to knock a nosepiece off. I searched for a couple of minutes and couldn’t find it. So I attempted to put the glasses in my pants pocket.

Ummmm, Houston, we have a problem! I had my running pants on backward. How in the HELL, I did that, I don’t have a clue, but when I attempted to put my glasses in my front pocket, they were definitely on backward. I wasn’t going to drop my drawers in the middle of the road to switch them around, especially in 20*F weather.

So I just kept running, and it didn’t seem to bother a whole lot, so not a big deal. Just another episode of Harold being Harold.

However, running in the snow is a LOT different than walking on it. For me, it is the toe-off that gets me in trouble. With each stride, my forefoot would press about three inches into the snow and then spin-out backward. The Santiago’s were OK, but the lugs were not long enough to be effective in this snow type.

Going up the hill in the back of the house was slow and steady—no rushing or pushing the pace. Needless to say, I was happy when I finally got to where the trail turns left at the old oak.

It is mostly downhill from there, with a couple of small bumps to contend with. Once I got over on the other side, they had gone out with the trail groomer, and it was worse to run on than the ungroomed trail. The snow was too much powder and just damned challenging to run on.

When I got down to Shepard Road, I turned back, and everything that was down the hill was now uphill. Once I got across the road again, I headed up the “hill”. Between the lack of traction and the mountain, I walked a bit on this section. It was faster than the pace I was maintaining running, so it made more sense.

Plus, I wasn’t attempting to kill myself on this run. It was more a strength training run in the snow. I feel that if I did this run 2-3 times a week, I would be in pretty good shape for Spring when it gets here. It is a tough one, though, and I am not interested in getting in great shape by those means.

Wimpy, aren’t I?

After getting off the snowmobile trail, I did another lap around Howard Circle at a little quicker pace than I could on the trail. I had a bit of traction on the tar.

Overall, it was a challenging run that I needed after the past couple of days, where I had to stop the runs early due to gastric issues. While I wasn’t able to run the entire course, the conditions were such that I have a feeling I wouldn’t be alone in doing a bit of walking up that hill coming back this morning.

Oh yeah, during my cool-down, I was able to find the missing nosepiece on the ground and super glued it back on when I got home.

I even made it in the house without anyone noticing that my running pants were on backward. Hehehehe. See, you have to be able to laugh at yourself when you do something like that.