Nov 28, 2012
So just another Turkey Trot in the books, right? Wrong!! Coldest. Race. Ever. But ironically, not my worst. Let me ‘splain.
A couple of weeks ago I signed all three of us for the Turkey Trot: me for the 4 miler and Zach and Mike for the “Mashed Potato Mile”. I thought it would be a fun thing for us all to do together on Thanksgiving morning. They could even just walk the mile and that would be totally cool. Plus the Jingle Bell Run was right around the corner – Dec 8 – so I thought it would be good to get out there for them!
So cut to Wed night (the night before the race) when I went to pick up the shirts/bibs at Aurora. It was brutally cold that night and I started to wonder about the weather for race day. You know, nothing like planning ahead. So I looked up the weather prediction and freaked. The temp was going to be 19 at 8am with a real feel of 1. You see, I’m really not a cold weather runner. Cold to me is anything below 40 degrees!!! Enter my love/hate relationship with treadmills. Ugh, this is not going to be pretty! Zach and Mike had already bagged it and I was lacking motivation. I kept thinking about the yoga class offered the same time as the race in a nice, warm, studio. So tempting!!! Thankfully I turned to my new friends in Jenny Hadfield’s “Holiday Challenge” group on Facebook for encouragement and motivation and found the drive to go for it! Plus two years ago I had bagged this same race because it was going to be too cold (I think it may have been in the 30’s – oye). And then last year at this race – it was a beautiful mild day and I PR’d. So yeah, this race and I have a history and I wasn’t going to back down!!
Proof of the temperature that morning – brutal!!! Lower than they predicted!
So these were the apparel choices for the day:
Cold weather tights
Two pair of socks/shoes
Short sleeved tech shirt
Long sleeved tech shirt with finger holes
Fleece with finger holes
Hat
Two pair of gloves: one tight cotton and one Under Armour over
Headband to use as a mouth covering
Here I am feeling as crazy as I look waiting for the start
The race itself was not bad at all. Thankfully the roads were not icy, just a little slushy. The sun was out at the beginning of the morning, but at the end of the race it was lightly snowing which was kind of cool. To be honest, the worst part of the morning was waiting in line for the portapotty (of course there was a trip to the portapotty – it is me. And by the way, they still stink when it is only 16 degrees!!)
About 1/2 mile in I had to start taking clothes off. Hat, gone (I had pockets in my fleece). Then about 2 miles in the first set of gloves came off. With 1/2 mile to go the other set of gloves came off! I made good clothing choices for the weather, but probably would tweak it for next time or if I suddenly get into cold weather running (doubt it). But my body and lungs felt great. My only problem was getting too warm out there. Towards the end I began to just feel really grateful that I could do this and remembered folks that can’t.
Happy girl at the finish!
I didn’t stick around very long after I finished the race. Once I stopped moving I got really chilly!! Being sweaty in 16 degrees does not bode well!! Plus I was eager to take a nice, warm, shower and get ready for our Thanksgiving dinner company.
I did not PR or anything, but given the temp I’m just glad I went and was happy with my time!
Time: 41:49
Pace: 10:30
I placed 14/32 of women in my age group – so top half – I’ll take it!